■
K
L
jjHjta^
I- J J
BT 75 .M55 v.l, c.2
Miley, John, 1813-1895
Systematic theology
Copy
^
LIBRARY
BIBLICAL AND THEOLOGICAL
LITERATURE
EDITED BY
GEOPwGE R. CROOKS, D.D.
AND
JOHIST F. HURST, D.D.
VOL. v.— SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY
NEW YORK: HUNT & EATON
CINCINNAl'I: CRANSTON dc S7 OWE
1892
PUBLISHERS' ANNOUNCEMENT.
FTIHE design of the Editors and Publishers of the Biblical
AND Theological Libraky is to Wnish ministers and lay-
men with a series of works which, in connection with the
Commentaries now issuing, shall make a compendious appa-
ratus for study. While the theology of the volumes will be in
harmony with the doctrinal standards of the Methodist Episcopal
Church, the aim will be to make the entire Library acceptable
to all evangelical Christians.
The following writers will co-operate in the anthorship of
the series: Dr. Harman, on the Introduction to the Study of
the Holy Scriptures ; Dr. Terry, on Biblical liermeneutics ;
Dr. Bennett, on Christian Archaeology ; Dr. Miley, on System-
atic Theology ; the Editors, on Theological Encyclopaedia and
Methodology ; Dr. Eidgaway, on the Evidences of Christianity ;
Prof. Charles J. Little, on Ciiristian Theism and Modern Spec-
ulative Thought ; Dr. Crooks, on the History of Christian
Doctrine ; and Bishop Hurst, on the History of the Christian
Church. The volumes on Introduction to the Scriptures, Bib-
lical Hermeneutics, Theological Encyclopaedia and Methodology,
Christian Archjeology, and the first volume of the Systematic
Theology have now been issued.
In the case of every treatise the latest literature will be con-
sulted, and its results incorporated. The works comprised in
the series will be printed in full octavo size, and finished in the
best style of typography and binding.
Systematic Theology
Jlaaa ypa^fj -dEonvevaTog koX LxptTiiiiog trpbc SidaaKaklav. — St. Paul
The whole drift of the Scripture of God, what is it but to teach Theology ? Theology,
what is it but the Science of things divine ? What Science can be attained unto without
the help of natural Discourse and Reason ? — Hooker
JOHN' MILEY, D.D., LL.D.
Professor o/ Systematic Theology in Drew Theological Setninary, Madison, New Jersey
VOLUME I
NEW YORK: HUNT &> EATON
CINCINNATI: CRANSTON &* STOWE
1892
Copyright, 1892, by
HUNT & EATON,
New York.
TABLE OF CONTENTS.
INTRODUCTION.
I. Theology. pagk
1. Sense and Use of the Ground-Term 2
2. Theology with Differentiating Terms , 2
3. Definitive Facts of Systematic Theology 4
4. Relation of Systematic to Other Forms of Theology ... 6
H. Sources of Theology.
1. Nature a Source of Theology S
2. Revelation the Source of Theology 11
3. Mistaken Sources 13
4. Concerning the Christian Consciousness • 18
m. Scientific Basis of Theology.
1. Certitude a Requirement of Science 22
2. Unwarranted Limitation to Empirical Facta 23
3. Grounds of Certitude in Theology 26
4. Consistency of Faith with Scientific Certitude 37
5. The Function of Reason in Theology 39
IV. Systemization a Right of Theology.
1. Theology Open to Scientific Treatment 47
2. Objections to the Systemization 48
3. Reasons for the Systemization 50
v. Method of Systemization.
1. Various Methods in Use 51
2. True Method in the Logical Order 53
3. Subjects as Given in the Logical Order 53
PART I.— theism:.
CHAPTER I.
PRELIMINARY QUESTIONS.
, The Sense of Theism.
1. Doctrinal Content of the Term 57
2. Historic View of the Idea of God 57
3. Account of Perverted Forms of the Idea 58
4. Definitive Idea of God • • • 59
vi CONTENTS.
n. Origin of the Idea of God. pagk
1. Possible Sources of the Idea 61
8. An Intuition of the Moral Reason 62
3. Objective Truth of the Idea 71
CHAPTER n.
PROOFS OF THEISM.
I. The Ontological Argument.
1. Logical Ground of the Argument 73
8. DiflEerent Constructions of the Argument 73
H. 1'he Cosmological Argument.
1. Validity of the Law of Causation 76
8. Dependence of the Cosmos 80
3. Inadequacy of Natural Forces to its Formation 81
4. Theistic Conclusion 85
HI. The Teleological Argument.
1. The Doctrine of Final Cause 86
2. Rational Ends in Human Agency 86
8. Rational Ends in the Cosmos 87
4. Objections to Finality in Organic Nature 98
IV. The Anthropological Argiiment.
1. Special Facts of Organic Constitution 97
2. Rational Mind a Spiritual Essence 98
8. Material Genesis of Mind an Impossibility 101
4. Mental Adaptations to Present Relations 104
6. Proofs of a Moral Nature in God 106
CHAPTER m.
ANTITHEISTIC THEORIES.
I. Atheism.
1. Me!).ning of Atheism 110
2. Negations of Atheism Ill
8. Dialectic Impotence of Atheism 118
H. Pantheism.
1. Doctrinal Statement of Pantheism 113
2. Monistic Ground of Pantheism 115
3. Relation of Pantheism to Morality and Religion 116
III. Positivism.
1. The Positive Pliilosophy 117
2. The Philosophy Antitheistic 121
8. The Kindred Secularism 123
IV. Naturalistic Evolution.
1. Theory of Evolution 125
2. Distinction of Theistic and Naturalistic Evolution 126
3. Perplexities of the Naturalistic Theory 127
4. No Disproof of Theism 135
CONTENTS. vii
CHAPTEE IV.
ANTITHEISTIC AGNOSTICISM.
I. Denial of Divine Personality. page
1. Assumption of Limitation in Personality 137
2. Erroneous Doctrine of the Infinite and Absolute 139
3. The True Infinite and Absolute 144
4. Personality the Highest Perfection 148
II. Denial of Divine Cognoscibility.
1. The Infinite Declared Unthinkable 151
2. Concerning the Limitation of Religious Thought 153
3. God Truly Knowable 153
F»ARX II.— THEOLOGY.
CHAPTER I.
GOD IN BEING.
I. Being and Attribute.
1. Definitive Sense of Attribute 159
2. Distinctive Sense of Being 160
3. Connection of Attribute and Being 160
4. True Method of Treatment 160
5. Common Error of Method 161
II. Spirituality of Being.
1. Notion of Being through Attribute 161
2. Requirement for Spiritual Being 163
3. Truth of Divine Spirituality 163
4. God Only in Spirituality 163
5. Immutability of Being 164
6. Question of Divine Infinity 164
CHAPTER n.
GOD IN PERSONALITY.
I. Personality.
1. Determining Facts of Personality 166
2. Requisites of All Personality 169
II. The Divine Personality.
1. In the Light of the Human 170
8. Same Complex of Powers Requisite 170
3. Personality Manifest in Proofs of Theism ,, 170
4. The Sense of Scripture 172
5. God Only in Personality 173
vili CONTENTS.
CHAPTER in.
GOD IX ATTRIBUTES.
I. Classif.mtion of the Attributes. • pa«k
1. Method of Classification 174
2. Artificial Classifications 175
3. Classification on the Ground of Personality 177
4. Category of the Attributes 178
I
II. Divine Omniscience.
1. Sense of Omniscience 180
2. Respecting Future Free Volitions 180
3. Truth of Omniscience 185
4. Distinctions of Divine Knowledge 188
5. Omniscience and Divine Personality 189
6. Divine Wisdom 198
III. Divine Sensibility.
1. Sense of Divine Sensibility 194
2. Truth of Divine Sensibility 194
3. Distinctions of Divine Sensibility 195
IV. Modes of Divine Moral Sensibility.
1. Holiness 199
2. Justice 201
3. Love 204
4. Mercy 209
5. Truth 210
V. Divine Omnipotence.
1. Power of Personal Will 211
2. Modes of Voluntary Agency 212
3. Omnipotence of the Divine Will 213
CHAPTER IV.
DIVINE PRBDICABLES NOT DISTINCTIVELY ATTRIBUTES.
I. Eternity of God.
1. Sense of Divine Eternity 214
2. Eternity of Original Cause 215
3. Truth of the Divine Eternity in Scripture 215
II. Unity of God.
1. Sense of Divine Unity 216
2. Rational Evidence of Divine Unity 216
3. Unity of God in the Scriptures 216
4. No Requirement for Plurality 217
HI. Omnipresence of God.
1 . Notion of an Infinite Essence 217
2. Omnipresence through Personal Perfections 219
3. The True Sense of Scripture 219
CONTENTS. ix
IV. Immutability of Grod. page
1. The Truth in Scripture 221
2. Immutability of Personal Perfections 221
3. Immutability of Moral Principles 221
CHAPTEE V.
GOD IN TRINITY,
I. Questions of the Trinity.
1. The Unity of God 223
2. Trinal Distinction of Divine Persons 224
3. Union of the Three in Divine Unity 225
II. Treatment of the Trinity.
1. Incipiency of the Doctrine 226
2. The Great Trinitarian Creeds 226
3 Content of the Creeds 227
4. The Doctrinal Result 229
CHAPTER VI.
THE SON OP GOD.
1. Doctrine of the Sonship.
1 . Fatherhood and Sonship 232
2. Lower Sense of Filiation 233
3. A Divine Sonship 235
4. Generation of the Son 237
5. Consubstantiality with the Father 239
6. Doctrine of Subordination 239
II. Divinity of the Son.
1. Divine Titles 240
2. Divine Attributes 246
3. Divine Works 250
4. Divine Worshipf ulness 254
CHAPTER Vn.
THE HOLY SPIRIT.
I. Personality of the Spirit.
1. Determining Facts of Personality 257
2. The Holy Spirit a Person 257
3. Procession of the Spirit 260
II. Divinity of the Spirit.
1. Attributes of Divinity 262
2. Works of Divinity 263
3. Supreme Worship fulness 265
4. Relative Subordination , 266
CONTENTS.
CHAPTER Vin.
TEUTH OF THE TRINTTT.
I. Proofs of the Trinity. page
1. Omission of Questionable Proofs 267
2. Verity of the Constituent Facts 268
3. The Facts Determinative of the Doctrine 268
II. Mystery of the Trinity.
1. Above our Reason 269
2. Without Analogies 269
3. ACredible Truth 271
4. A Vital Truth of Christianity 371
CHAPTER IX.
GOD IN CREATION.
I. The Question of Creation.
1. Several Spheres of Creative Work 276
2. Question of Creation Threefold 277
II. Concerning the Creation of Matter.
1. The Question on A Priori Ground 279
2. On Cosmological Ground 281
3. On Teleological Ground 282
4. In the Light of Scripture 282
III. Several Spheres of Creation.
1. The Physical Cosmos 287
2. Living Orders of Existence 287
3. Man 288
4. Angels 289
IV. The Mystery of Creation.
1. Mystery of Immediate Creation 291
2. Deeper Mystery of Emanation 292
3. Evil Tendency of Emanative Doctrine 294
4. Mode of Divine Agency in Creating 294
5. Freedom of God in Creating 295
V. Mosaic Cosmogony and Science.
1. Hisioric Character of the Mosaic Narrative 298
2. Theories of Mosaic Consistency with Science 300
3. Concerning a Second and Modem Creation 302
4. Mosaic Days of Creative Work 303
5. The Six Days and the Sabbath 304
6. Consistency of Genesis and Geology 305
CONTENTS. xi
CHAPTER X.
GOD IN PROVIDENCE.
I. Leading Questions of Providence. page
1. Providential Conservation and Government 311
2. Universality of Providential Agency 813
3. Distinction of Providential Spheres 313
4. Distinctions of Providential Agency 313
II. Providence in th.e Physical Sphere.
1. Concerning the Conservation of Matter 314
2. View of Conservation as Continuous Creation 316
3. Question of Physical Forces 318
4. Providence in the Orderly Forms of Matter 321
III. Providence in Animate Nature.
1. Reality and Mystery of Life 325
2. Providence in the Sphere of Life 326
3. The View of Scripture 326
IV. Providence in the Realm of Mind.
1 . Reality of Power in Mind 327
2. Profound Truth of Personal Agency 327
3. Providence over Free Personalities 328
4. The Sense of Scripture 329
V. Formulas of Providential Agency.
1. As General and Special 330
2. As Immanent and Transcendent 331
3. As Natural and Supernatural 332
4. Illustrations of the Natural and the Supernatural 333
5. The Mode of Providence often Hidden 334
VI. Truth of a Supernatural Providence.
1. A Truth of Theism 336
2. A Truth of Moral Government 336
3. A Truth of the Divine Fatherhood 337
4. A Clear Truth of the Scriptures 338
5. Providence the Privilege of Prayer 339
6. Review of Leading Objections 341
, PART III.— ANTHROPOLOGY.
CHAPTER I.
PRELIMINAET QUESTIONS.
I. The Origin of Man.
1. In Theories of Evolution 355
2. In the Sense of Scripture 356
3. Relation of the Question to Theology 357
xii CONTENTS.
H. Time of Man's Origin. pack
1. In the View of Biblical Chronology 359
2. Scientific Claim of a High Antiquity 861
3. Review of Alleged Proofs 362
III. The Unity of Man.
1. Question of a Unity of Species 370
2. Theory of Unity with Plurality of Origins 372
3. Distinctions of Race and the Question of Unity 373
4. Scientific Evidences of Specifical Unity 377
5. The Scripture Sense of Unity 383
6. A Special Theory of Pre-adamites 385
7. Doctrinal Interest in the Question of Unity 389
CHAPTER n.
PRIMITIVE MAN.
I. Literal Sense of Mosaic Narrative.
1. Historic Style of the Narrative 394
2. Historical Connections of the Narrative 395
3. Uncertainty of a Figurative Interpretation 395
4. Scripture Recognition of a Literal Sense 395
n. Primary Questions of Mosaic Narrative.
1. Constituent Natures of Man 397
2. The Question of Trichotomy 398
3. Original Physiological Constitution 403
4. Intellectual Grade of Primitive Man 403
5. Created in the Image of God 406
CHAPTER m.
QUESTION OF PRIMITrVE HOLINESS.
I. Nature of Holiness in Adam.
1. Determining Law of Limitation 409
2. Fundamental Distinctions of Holiness 409
3. Nature of Adamic Holiness 410
4. Possibility of Holiness in Adam 412
II. Proofs of Primitive Holiness. ^
1. Implication of the Moral Nature 414
2. Primitive Man Very Good 414
3. Further Scripture Proofs 415
4. Error of Pelagianism 416
III. Elements of Primitive Holiness.
1 . The Romish Doctrine 418
2. The Augustinian Doctrine 420
3. Elements of the True Doctrine 421
CONTENTS. xiii
CHAPTEE IV.
THE PRIMITIVE PROBATIOIT.
I. Probation a Reasonable Economy. page
1. Trial as Naturally Incident to Duty 423
2. Complete Ability for Obedience 424
3. Obedience a Eeasonable Eequirement 424
4. Moral Necessity for a Law of Duty 424
n. The Probationary Law.
1. A Matter of Divine Determination 424
2. The Law as Divinely Instituted 425
3. A Proper Test of Obedience 426
III. Favorable Probationary Trial.
1. Law of Duty Open and Plain 427
2. Complete Moral Healthfulness of Man 427
3. Ample Sources of Satisfaction 427
4. Most Weighty Eeasons for Obedience 427
CHAPTEE V.
TEMPTATION AND FALL, OF MAN.
I. The Primitive Temptation.
1. Concerning an Instrumental Agency 429
2. A Higher, Satanic Agency 430
3. Manner of the Temptation '. 430
II. The Pall of Man.
1. Entering into the Temptation 431
2. Penalty of the Sinning 431
3. Fall of the Eace 432
III. Freedom of Man in Falling.
1. Probationary Obedience a Divine Preference 433
2. Divine Gift of the Power of Obedience 433
3. Power of Obedience Intrinsic to Probation 433
4. The Facts Conclusive of Freedom in Falling 434
rv. Sinning of Holy Beings.
1. The Question in the Light of the Facts 434
2. Primitive Susceptibilities to Temptation 435
3. Moral Forces Available for Obedience 435
4. The Sinning Clearly Possible 436
V. Divine Permission of the Fall.
1. The Creation of Moral Beings Permissible 437
2. Permissibility of a Probationary Economy 437
3. Permissibility of the Fall 437
4 The Event Changes Not the Economy 438
5. Eedemption and the Permission of the Fall 438
6. Question of the Fall of Angels 439
xiv CONTENTS.
CHAPTER VL
DOCTRINE OF NATIVE DEPRAVITY.
I. Formula of Original Sin. page
1. Analysis of the Formula 441
2. Doctrinal Isolation of Native Depravity 442
II. Doctrinal Sense of Depravity.
1. A Subjective Moral State 442
2. Broadly in the Sensuous and Moral Nature 443
3. Meaning of Depravation from Deprivation 444
4. Characteristic Evil Tendency of Depravity 445
CHAPTER Vn.
PROOFS OF NATIVE DEPRAVITY.
I. More Direct Scripture Proofs.
1. Testimony of Particular Texts 446
2. Impossibility of Righteousness and Life by Law 449
3. Necessity for Spiritual Regeneration 450
II. Proof in the Prevalence of Sin.
1. Universality of Actual Sin 451
2. The Proof of an Evil Tendency in Man 453
3. Only Rational Account of Universal Sin 454
4. Concerning Natural Virtues 456
m. Further Proofs of a Fallen State.
1. Manifold Ills of Human Life 458
2. Mortality of the Race 458
3. Small Success of Moral and Religious Agencies 459
4. The Common Spiritual Apathy 461
CHAPTER Vin.
ORIGIN OF DEPRAVrrr.
I. Adamic Origin.
1. Limitations of the Question of Origin 462
2. Origin in the Adamic Fall 462
3. Transmissible Effects of Adam's Sin 463
4. Secular Consequences of the Adamic Fall 464
5. Deeper Moral Consequence in Depravity 464
H. Law of Adamic Origin.
1. Theory of Penal Retribution 465
2. On the Ground of Adamic Sin 465
3. Realistic and Representative Modes of Adamic Sin 466
4. Theory of the Genetic Transmission of Depravity 467
5. Doctrinal Distinction of the Two Theories 467
CONTENTS. XV
m. Speculative or Mixed Theories. page
1. Mediate Imputation of Adamic Sin 468
3. Hypothetic Ground of the Imputation of Sin 470
3. Origin of Sin in a Pre-existent Life 471
CHAPTER IX.
REALISTIC MODE OF ADAMIC SIN.
I. Generic Oneness of the Race.
1. A Generic Human Nature 474
2. The Generic Nature Rational and Voluntary 476
3. Adam the Generic Nature 476
4. The Agent in the Primitive Sin 477
5. All Men a Part in the Sinning 477
H. Objections to the Theory.
1. Groundless Assumption of a Generic Nature 479
2. Impossible Individuation into the Many 480
3. Equally Sharers in all Ancestral Deeds 481
4. No Responsible Part in the Primitive Sin 484
III. A Lower Form of Realism.
1. Definitive Statement of the Theory 488
2. Doctrinal Aim of the Theory 489
8. The Theory Inadequate to the Aim 489
IV. Objections to the Lower Realism.
1. Implication of Seminal Guilt 491
3. Guilty of All Ancestral Sins 491
3. Repentance and Forgiveness of the Race in Adam 492
CHAPTER X.
REPRESENTATIVE MODE OF ADAMIC GTJTLT.
I. Legal Oneness of the Race.
1. Federal Headship of Adam 493
2. Immediate Imputation of His Sin 493
3. No Demerit from the Imputation 495
II. Alleged Proofs of the Theory.
1. Responsibility on the Ground of Representation 495
2. Biblical Instances of Imputation of Sin 497
3. More Direct Proof-Texts 498
4. Imputation of the Righteousness of Christ 499
III. Objections to the Theory.
1 . No Such Headship of Adam 501
2. Supersedure of a Common Probation 503
3. Guilt and Punishment of the Innocent 503
4. Factitious Guilt of the Race 504
5. A Darker Problem of Evil 504
avx contents.
CHAPTER XI.
GENETIC LAW OF NATIVE DEPRAVITY.
I. Genesis of Parental Quality. pare
1 . Reality of the Law 505
2. Respecting the Transmission of Adamic Holiness 500
3. Sufficient Account of Native Depravity 506
II. The True Law of Depravity.
1. The Scripture Doctrine 507
2. The Catholic Doctrine 508
3. The Arminian Doctrine 508
4. Unaffected Reality of Native Depravity 509
CHAPTER XII.
DOCTRINE OF NATIVE DEMERIT.
I. Alleged Proofs of the Doctrine.
1. More Direct Scripture Proofs 511
2. A Metaphysical Argument 513
3. Argument from Christian Consciousness 514
4. Argument from Primitive Holiness 51G
II. Difficulties of the Doctrine.
1. Demerit of a Mere Nature 516
2. Demerit without Personal Agency 517
3. Demerit of Childhood 518
4. Demerit from Punishment 518
5. An Unintelligible Sin 518
6. The Ground of Election and Reprobation 519
HI. The True Arminian Doctrine.
1. Native Depravity without Native Demerit 521
2. The Doctrine of our Seventh Article 522
3. The Requirement of a True Definition of Sin 527
4. Native Depravity a Reality and a Moral Ruin 529
5. Question of Practical Results 530
INTRODUCTION.
Theology holds a chief place in human thinking. In a purely
intellectual view no questions have greater interest for scientific
and philosophic thought. Besides, our moral and religious sensi-
bilities, the profoundest of our nature, contribute an intensity of
interest peculiar to theological study. This does not mean that
religious feeling is the norm or ruling principle of theology. This
study has its intellectual cast, just as questions of science and phi-
losophy. Any peculiarities of theology relate mostly to the char-
acter of its subjects and the sources of its facts. The study of
these facts, the processes of induction, and the doctrinal gen-
eralizations are in the same intellectual mode which we observe in
other spheres of trutli. The Scriptures are rich in doctrinal ma-
terial, but in elementary form; and it is only through a scientific
mode of treatment that these elements can be wrought into a the-
ology in any proper sense of the term. " The whole drift of the
Scripture of God, what is it but only to teach theology ? Theol-
ogy? what is it but the science of things divine ? What science
can be attained unto without the help of natural discourse and
reason?^' '
Before entering uj^on the formal treatment of any great subject
the way should be j^repared, and the subject itself be preparatory
set in as clear a light as practicable. This is specially nEyuisiTEs.
urgent in the case of systematic theology. The Introduction is for
this end, and its attainment requires several things. The several
forms of theology must be distinguished and defined. We shall
thus reach a clearer view of systematic theology. The true sources
of theology must be determined and mistaken sources set aside.
As the doctrinal value of the Scriptures hinges upon the question
of their divine original, the proofs of such an original must be fully
recognized.'' Attention must be given to the grounds of certitude
in doctrinal truths and to the consistency of faith with the requi-
site certitude, that we may secure a scientific construction of the-
^ Hooker : Ecclesiastical Polity, book iii, sec. 8.
- The doctrine of inspiration will be treated in an appendix to the second
volume.
2 INTRODUCTION.
ology. Finally, the method of systcmization must be considered
in order to determine what doctrines should be included in the sys-
tem and in what order they should be treated.
L Theology.
1. Sense and Use of the Gronnd-term. — The term theology is
formed from the Greek words Oeo^ and Xoyn^, and means primarily
a di.seourse concerning God, or a doctrine of God. It was in use
anterior to Christianity, and in literature entirely apart from the
divine revelation. Aristotle wrote of theology as one of the sciences,
and as the highest of all, because it treated of the highest of all
beings. The Greeks gave the name of theologian — OeoXoyo^ — sever-
ally to such poets as Ilesiod and Orpheus, because they eang of the
gods and the origin of things, though with only poetic inspiration.
"We are more concerned with the use of this term in the expres-
sion of Christian thought. In this use the primary
THKOLOGY IN to 1 J
CHRISTIAN sense has been greatly broadened, so that it often means
THOUGHT. ^1^^ g^j^ ^j Christian doctrine. This appears in what
may be accepted as its proper definitions. " God is the source and
the subject and the end of theology. The stricter and earlier use
of the word limited it to the doctrine of the triune God and his
attributes. But in modern usage it includes the whole compass of
the science of religion, or the relations of all things to God." ' " The-
ology, therefore, is the exhibition of the facts of Scripture in their
proper order and relation with the principles or general truths in-
volved in the facts themselves, and which pervade and harmonize
the whole."' These definitions reach far toward a definition of
systematic theology, and yet do not transcend the meaning of the
term theology in its present use. As the ground-term it may con-
sistently be used in so broad a sense. There is still a place for the
distinct form of systematic theology.
2. Tlieology with Differentiating Terms. — Under this head we
may state briefly and in a definitive manner, the different forms or
distinctions of theology.
Natural theology has its special distinction from revealed the-
NATURAL THE- ^logy. Thls polnts directly to a distinction of sources.
OLOGY. The light of nature is the source of the one, and revelation
the source of the other. This distinction means the limitations of
the natural compared with the revealed. Many of the deeper
truths of Christianity could never be discovered simply in the light
of nature. No truths of theology are so clearly given therein as in
' Pope : Christian Theology, vol. i, p. 3.
* Hodge : Systematic Theology, vol. i, p. 19.
THEOLOGY. 3
the Scriptures. Yet the existence of God and our moral responsi-
bility to him, and the duties of obedience and worship, are manifest
in the light of nature. We must find in nature the proof of God's
existence before we are prepared for the question of a revelation
from him. In view of these facts we may properly retain the
formula of natural theology. Revealed theology, simply as such,
needs no further statement at this point.
Exegetical theology is a formula in use, particularly in the ter-
minology of theological seminaries. It has no direct exegetical
doctrinal meaning, its specific office being simply the theology.
interpretation of the Scriptures ; but it is properly named here be-
cause of the valuable service which biblical exegesis renders in pre-
paring the material with which the theologian must construct his
doctrines. This will be joointed out in another place.
Biblical theology is closely related to exegetical, but advances to
a doctrinal position. The Scriptures furnish the material with
which it works, and which it casts into doctrinal forms. Biblical
theology has nothing to do with the confessions or formulas of faith
which ajDpear in the history of doctrines. In dealing with such
creeds it departs from its own proper sphere and enters that of dog-
matic theology. While limited to the Scriptures it need not cover
the whole, and rarely does. Sometimes the Old Testament is the
subject,' and sometimes the New.^ Often the chosen part is only
a small fraction of the Scriptures.' With such limitation the term
biblical can properly mean only the form of theology.
Dogmatic theology has its proper distinction from both biblical
and systematic, though often used in the same sense as dogmatic
the latter. It is not limited to the Scriptures, like the theology.
biblical, nor has it by any requirement the comprehensiveness of
the systematic. Dogmatic theology deals largely with the same
material as historical theology, but in a different mode. Its work
is with creeds or symbols of faith, not, however, in a mere presen-
tation of their contents or history of their formation, but rather
in a discussion of the doctrines which they embody. It may be
in its mode either affirmative or controversial. Mostly, dogmatic
theology devotes itself to the creed of a particular school. There
is no necessary inclusion of all the doctrinal symbols of such
school. Dogmatic theology may be Just as free from dogmatism in
any philosophic sense of the term, and just as scientific in its prin-
ciples and method, as systematic theology. Its distinctive character
' Oehler : Theology of the Old Testament.
^ Schmid : Biblical Theology of the New Testament.
* Crooks and Hurst : Theological Encyclopaedia and Methodology, pp. 391-293.
4 INTRODUCTION.
is in its close connection with doctrinal symbols and the permissible
limitation of its subjects.
Historical theology is often used in a sense to include ecclesi-
iiisTouicAi, astical history, but the doctrines of the Church are its
THEOLOGY. spccific subjcct. In its subject, therefore, it is closely
related to dogmatic theology, but still has its own distinctive char-
acter. This will appear in the statement of its definitive facts. It
is the office of historical theology to trace the history of doctrines
from their incipiency in individual opinion down to their full de-
velopment and formation. The truth of a doctrine is no condition
of its proper place in this history. Athanasianism and Arianism,
Augustinianism and Pelagianism, Protestantism and Romanism,
Arminianism and Calvinism, are alike entitled to candid treat-
ment. Such treatment fulfills the office of historical theology.
When the historian of doctrines enters into their formal discus-
sion, supi:)orting some and controverting others, he so far dej^arts
from his own proper function and enters the sphere of dogmatic
theology.
In logical order, practical theology follows the systematic; yet
PKACTicAL for the present we find it convenient to reverse this
THEOLOGY. ordcr. Theology in its strictly doctrinal sense is viewed
as completed when we reach practical theology; so that the latter
has no proper doctrinal content. Yet it is so related to the practical
ends of theology as to be fairly entitled to the use of the gi'ound-
term. Practical theology is concerned with the methods for the
effective application of doctrinal truths to their practical ends. " It
thus possesses a claim to scientific character. For while all the-
ology aims, in its character as a positive science, to affect the life of
human beings, it is yet incomplete without that department which
is most directly engaged in carrying that positive aim into effect.
It is, accordingly, with entire justice that practical theology has
been termed by Schleiermacher ' the crown of the tree. ' " ' The
truth should be specially emphasized, that the practical forces of
Christianity, whether for the Christian life or the evangelizing work
of the Church, are embodied in the doctrines of Christian theology.
This is the requirement for the methods of practical theology where-
by these forces m.ay be most effectively applied to the Christian life
and the work of the Church.
3. Definitive Facts of Si/stcmatic Theology. — In stating the other
forms of theology the distinctive character of the systematic also
appeared ; but for clearness of view we require additional state-
ments.
' Crooks and Hurst : Theological Encyclopcedia and Methodology, p. 473.
THEOLOGY. 5
The special subjects of systematic theology are the doctrines of
Christianity. It is not meant that the doctrines so doctrines tub
designated have their only source in the New Testa- sLiiJEci.
ment. All the doctrines of religion which have a ground of truth
in either nature or the Old Testament also belong to this form of
theology. But as the doctrines from such sources have their recog-
nition and fuller unfolding in the New Testament we may properly
designate all as the doctrines of Christianity. The sense of the
term doctrine is not hidden. Any principle or law reached and
verified through a proper induction is a doctrine, whether in sci-
ence, philosophy, or theology. Thus there are doctrines of physics,
chemistry, geology, ethics, metaphysics. So in theology: certain
truths reached and verified through a proper induction are doc-
trines in the truest sense of the term. We may instance the per-
sonality of God, the divine Trinity, the person of Christ, the
atonement, justification by faith. Systematic theology deals with
such truths, and for completeness it must include the sum of
Christian doctrines.
The doctrines severally must be constructed in a scientific man-
ner. A system of theology is a combination of doc-
'' . , °'' TREATMENT OP
trines in scientific accord. But the several doctrines each doc-
are no more at hand in proper form than the system it- '^'"^'^•
self. Hence the requirement for the construction of the doctrines
severally. This is possible only through a scientific process.
Through a careful study of the facts of geology the doctrines of the
science are reached and verified, while in turn they illuminate the
facts. Through a careful study and profound analysis of the rela-
tive facts the great doctrine of gravitation was reached and verified.
The multiform facts are thus united and interpreted and set in a
light of new interest. So must systematic theology study the
elements of doctrinal truth, whether furnished in the book of
nature or the book of revelation, and in a scientific mode com-
bine them in doctrines. Very many facts point to a divine
Providence, moral responsibility, human sinfulness, atonement in
Christ ; but only through a like scientific use of the facts can we
reach the great doctrines which underlie these formulas. The
method is exemplified in the construction of a doctrine of the Trin-
ity by the Council of Nice and a doctrine of the person of Christ
by the Council of Chalcedon. Such symbols, however, give merely
the forms of doctrinal expression, not the processes of doctrinal
construction. Systematic theology is concerned with the whole
work of construction.
The doctrines, separately constructed, must be combined in a
6 INTRODUCTION.
Bystem. Only thus can we reach a systematic theology. The same
, ^ , , , principle which rules the construction of the doctrines
ci»MBi.\KD IN severally mudt rule their systemization. As all the ele-
A SYSTEM. ments combined in a doctrine must be in scientific accord,
BO all the doctrines combined in a system must be in like agreement.
As discordant elements cannot constitute a doctrine, so discordant
doctrines cannot constitute a system. Hence the requirement of
consistency in all the doctrines combined in the system must be
faithfully observed. As this imperative law of systemization is
manifest on its statement, and also must often appear in future dis-
cussions, it here requires no formal illustration.
The three facts presented under the present head characterize
systematic theology and differentiate it from the other forms previ-
ously stated. It3 specilic subjects are the doctrines and the sum of
the doctrines. It must construct the doctrines severally in a scien-
tific form. In tliis construction there must be a constant view to
the ruling principles of the system, else the doctrines may lack the
necessary consistency. Finally, the doctrines must be combined in
a system under the imperative law of a complete scientific agree-
ment. There is no specific function of interpretation, as in exeget-
ical theology ; no restriction to a purely scriptural ground, as in
biblical theology, and which may limit its treatment to a mere frac-
tion of the Scriptures ; no dealing chiefly with ecclesiastic symbols
of faith and without any requirement of a system, as in dogmatic
theology ; no simply historic office in tracing the development and
formation of doctrines and giving their contents, as in historical
theology. Systematic theology is broader and deeper. It must in-
clude all the doctrines which properly belong to a system, and may
freely command all the resources of doctrinal truth.
4. Relation of Systematic to Other Forms of Theology. — The dif-
ferent forms of theology are not severally isolated. Otherwise there
could be no proper methodology in the curriculum of theological
study. They are so related as readily to take their places in a log-
ical order. There is a close relation of systematic theology to the
other forms, particularly in the fact that mostly they furnish the
material, and much of it well prepared, for its use in the construc-
tion of doctrines.
This appears in the case of exegetical theology. The doctrines
are grounded in the Scriptures and, to be true, must be
RELATION TO ° .
KXF.fi KTicAL truo to tlic scusc of the Scriptures. The doctrinal sense
TiiKOLOGY. Yyqq chiefly in the appropriate texts, what we call the
proof-texts. It is the office of exegesis to give this sense. In this
view the texts are for doctrine what facts are for science. Hence
THEOLOGY. 7
exegesis fulfills in the former the office of observation and experi-
ment in the latter. The intimate relation between exegetical and
systematic theology and the valuable service which the former ren-
ders the latter are thus clearly seen. Systematic theology, however,
still has its own office to fulfill. As the generalizations of science
are a distinct work from the finding of the facts, so the construction
of doctrines is a distinct work from the interpretation of texts.
Biblical theology is subsidiary to systematic in a manner kindred to
the exegetical.
There is also an intimate relation to historical theology. In this
view we may include the dogmatic with the historical, „„,,„,„„ ^^
■^ " _ RELATION TO
as both deal so largely with the same material. The historical
two give us the history of doctrinal opinion and the re- '^"^^^^^"^•
suits of doctrinal construction. The doctrines so constructed are
not authoritative for systematic theology, but may render valuable
EGrvice in the prosecution of its own work. This may be the case
even when the method is wrong and the results erroneous. It has
been so in relation to various sciences. Alchemy prepared the way
for chemistry, and with all its vagaries performed a valuable service.
Astrology prepared the way for astronomy, and the gathered facts
were of great service in the transition from the false theory to the
true. The method of Linnaeus in botany is no longer accepted, but
the work which he wrought is of value to this day. No wise worker
in these spheres of science has overlooked this preparatory work or
failed to appropriate its fruits. So may the systematic theologian
find help in dogmatic and historical theology. This 'history dis-
closes many errors in theology, and many errors appear in dogmatic
symbols ; but the true can be set over against the false and be seen
the more clearly in the contrast. Besides, in many instances the
truth of doctrine has been reached and well formulated. The his-
tory of doctrines may thus help the work of systematic theology.
II. SouECES OF Theology.
On this question, as on many others, oj^posing theories have been
pushed to extremes beyond the truth in either. When it is said
that both nature and revelation are sources of theology there is truth
in both views ; but when it is said, on the one hand, that nature is
the only and entirely sufficient source, and, on the other, that rev-
elation is the only source, neither position is true. These are the
opposite extremes of error. The one theory maintains erroneous
that whatever we need to know of God and his will and views.
of our own duty and destiny may be discovered in the light of nat-
ure ; the other, that nature makes no revelation of God and duty.
8 INTRODUCTION.
and, at most, can only respond to the disclosures of a divine revela-
tion. The former position is naturally assumed by infidels who
yet hold the existence of God and the moral and religious constitu-
tion of man. It is necessary for them to exalt the light of nature.
Christianity early encountered this position of infidelity. Notably
was it the position of the leading deists of England in the seven-
teenth and eighteenth centuries. Christian apologists have not
been entirely free from the opposite tendency. Some have seemed
reluctant to concede any resource of religious truth in the light of
nature, lest they might jeopard the strongest ground of defense
against the assaults upon the Christian faith. There was very little
of this tendency with the great champions of revelation against the
English deists. Near the close of this great debate, however, and
especially at a later period, the position was assumed which logically
excludes all grounds of a natural theology. Such is really the posi-
tion of Watson.' No doubt the philosophy of Locke contributed
much to this tendency, though he himself wrote on Christianity
with an apologetic aim and fully admitted a light of nature, but
controverted its sufficiency."
On the broadest division there are two sources of theology — nat-
Two SOURCES ure and revelation. They are very far from any equality;
OF THEOLOGY, [ii fullncss, clcaruess, and authority fairly comparable
only by contrast. Some great truths of Christian theology are pe-
culiar to revelation. Yet the first question of all religion, the
existence of God, must be taken first to nature. The best Christian
thinkers agree in these two sources. For the present we are merely
stating them. The question of secondary sources will follow their
more direct treatment.
1. Nature a Source of Theology. — By nature we here mean all
things and events other than the divine revelation as distinctively
such and which may, in any mode or degree, manifest God or
his will or any other truth which is properly theological in its
content. Whether such truth is an intuition of the primary
reason, or a conclusion of the logical reason, or a product of the
moral and religious consciousness, it is a truth through the light
of nature. For the present we omit the Christian conscious-
ness as a specific form of the religious consciousness, because it
has been placed in such relation to this question as to require a
separate consideration. There is a sense in which all knowledge is
from God. He is the Author of our faculties and their correlations
to objective truths which render knowledge possible. As between
■' Theological Institutes, vol. i, chaps, iii-viii.
- The Reasonableness of Christianity, Works, vol. vii.
SOURCES OF THEOLOGY. 9
nature and revelation there is still the profound difference in the
modes of knowledge : in the one case its acquisition in
• • DISTINCTION
the use of human faculties ; in the other its imme- of nature
diate communication by the divine agency. Our intu- ^^^ keve-
. o ./ LATION.
itions of truth are no exception. In this case the mode
of acquisition is as purely human and as really different from its im-
mediate divine communication as in the acquisition of knowledge in
the use of the logical faculties. In the one case the discovery of
truth is mediated by the use of our own faculties ; in the other it is
immediately given by the supernatural agency of God. It is impor-
tant thus sharply to discriminate these two modes of truth, for only
thus can we properly distinguish nature and revelation as sources of
theology.
These statements may suffice for the present, for we are not
yet sturlying the theology of nature, but simply defining and
discriminating nature as a source of theology. How far this
source may be valid and available for a knowledge of God and
of our relations to him is for future inquiry. Without any incon-
gruity of method we might here consider the religious ideas every-
where disclosed in human history — ideas of God or of some super-
natural Being, whose providence is over over mankind and whom
men should worship and obey ; ideas of moral obligation and respon-
sibility, of future existence and retribution. And, further, we might
consider the evidence that these ideas are traceable to the light of
nature and rationally traceable to no other source. With these
facts established, and with the manifest theological content of these
ideas, we should have the truth of a theology in the light of nature.
But as these questions must arise with the question of theism it is
better to defer them.
It is proper here to point out that the Scriptures fully recognize
the works of nature and the moral constitution of man as manifes-
tations of God and various forms of religious truth. This is so
clearly the case that it may well be thought singular that any who
accept their supreme authority, and, particularly, that assume to
find in a supernatural revelation the only true original of theological
truth, should either overlook this recognition as a fact or its con-
clusive significance for a natural theology.
Nature in its manifold forms is a manifestation of the perfections,
providence, and will of God. "The heavens declare ^ light ov
the glory of God ; and the firmament showeth his handi- nature.
work." ' The orderly forms of the heavens, their magnitude and
magnificence, are a manifestation of the wisdom and power of God,
' Psa. xix, 1.
10 INTRODUCTION.
a mirror in whicli his glory shines. The manifestation is unto all
pcoi^lo. ''Lift up your eyes on high, and behold who hath created
these things, that hriugeth out their host by number : he calleth
them all by names by the greatness of his might, for that he is
strong in power ; not one faileth." ' This is God's appeal to men,
that ill the lieavens they would behold his power and wisdom and
providence. It would be useless to look upon the heavens for
any such purpose if they are not a manifestation of these perfections
in God. In the view of Paul facts of nature witnessed for God
unto men in the darkness of heathenism : " Nevertheless he left not
himself without witness, in that he did good, and gave us rain from
heaven, and fruitful seasons, filling our hearts with food and glad-
ness."* These facts could be witnesses of God unto men only as
manifestations of his being and providence. The great words of
Paul uttered on Mars' Hill are replete with the same ideas. ^ His
words in vindication of the divine judgments upon the wicked
heathen are specially noteworthy : " Because that which may be
known of God is manifest in them ; for God hath showed it unto
them. For the invisible things of him from the creation of the world
are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even
his eternal power and Godhead ; so that they are Avithout excuse."*
Words could not well be more to the point.
The Scriptures assert a common moral responsibility under the
light of nature. This fact is the more decisive of the
A LIGHT 0¥ ^ .
THE MORAL scusc of Scrlpturc on the present question, because the
REASON. responsibility asserted is not such as might arise under
atheism or pantheism, but such as requires the idea of God as a
moral ruler. This is clearly seen in the appropriate texts: "For
the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness
and unrighteou^ess of men, who hold the truth in unrighteous-
ness. . . . Because that, when they knew God, they glorified Imn
not as God, neither were thankful ; but became vain in their im-
aginations, and their foolish heart was darkened."' The applica-
tion is to the heathen under the light of nature, just as to men
under a formally revealed law. This is clear from the whole con-
nection, and particularly from the omitted verses — 19, 20. It is
thus the sense of the apostle that under the light of nature men
may so know God and his will as to be morally responsible to him.
It is upon this ground that divine retribution is visited upon the
Gentiles as upon the Jews, whose lives are in common given to
wickedness. " Gentiles without the law may yet by nature fulfill
' Isa. xl, 26. " Acts xiv, 17. » Acts xvii, 24-29.
••Eom. i, 19, 20. 'Eom. i, 18, 21. 6Rom. ii, 1-11.
SOURCES OF THEOLOGY. 11
its moral duties. In this they are a law imto themselves, and show
the work of the law written in their hearts. The conscience of such
is active in either self-approval or self-condemnation, and equally
in the moral judgment of others.' All this means a moral responsi-
bility under the light of nature — such a responsibility as can arise
only with the idea of God as moral ruler. Thus in two modes —
by an apj)eal to the works of nature as a manifestation of God and
his will and providence, and by the fact of moral responsibility
under the law of nature — the ScrijDtures fully recognize the light
of nature as a source of theology. It is yet the sense of the Script-
ures that there is a profound moral need of higher forms of relig-
ious truth which the light of nature cannot disclose.
2. Revelation the Source of Theology. — We here need a definitive
sense of revelation, though not an exact distinction be- gj-j^gK of ret-
tween revelation and inspiration. Eeligious truth com- elation.
municated through a supernatural agency of God is a revela-
tion. In this view the supernatural divine agency is the defining
fact of revelation, and will fully answer for the present require-
ment. The mode of this agency in the communication of religious
truth, except that it must be supernatural, is indifferent to its de-
finitive function. Whether the communication is by sign, or word,
or immediate inspiration, tlie agency is equally supernatural and
the communication equally a divine revelation. This supernatural
agency as the defining fact of revelation thoroughly distinguishes it
from nature as a source of theology.
It follows that revelation has no necessary biblical limitation.
Kelative facts neither require such a limitation nor
i _ NO NECESSARY
justify its assumption. In all generations sincere and biblical limi-
devout souls have been seeking for God and truth. In '^'^''''"''^•
a profound sense of need and out of the thick darkness they have
cried to Heaven for light and help. Who shall say that no such
prayer has ever been answered? According to the defining fact of
revelation, as above stated, any religious truth divinely given in
such answer, though not verified to the recipient as from God, is
yet a revelation. And to this source we would trace the higher
religious truths reached by heathen minds, rather than to unaided
reason and the light of nature, or to tradition. Yet, the highest
truths even so readied fall infinitely below the moral and religious
needs of mankind, and equally below the truths given in the Script-
ures, Besides, tliey lack the seal of a divine original, and, there-
fore, the certainty and authority necessary to their truest religious
value. While, therefore, we cannot question the divine communi-
' Eom. ii, 14, 15.
12 INTRODUCTION.
cation of some religious truth to devout minds, yet in a stricter
sense, as in the common theological view, revelation and the Script-
ures are one.
The Holy Scriptures are one source, and by all pre-eminence the
THE sDPUEME sourcc, of tlicology. Whether a divine revelation or
SOURCE. uot, or whatever their source, they contain the highest
religious truths ever attained by mankind. Let a comparison be
made with all that poets have sung and philosophers uttered, with
all that is contained in the sacred books of other forms of religion,
and the theology of the Scriptures will stand only in the clearer
light of peerless excellence. If tested by the purest moral and re-
ligious intuitions, or by the sharpest inquisition of the logical rea-
son, or by the profoundest sense of religious need, or by the satis-
faction which its truths bring to the soul, or by its sublime power
in the spiritual life, the theology of the Scriptures rises infinitely
above all other theologies of the world. That they are a direct
revelation from God, Avith the seal of a divine original clearly set
upon them, gives to their theology a certainty and sufficiency, a
grace and value, specially divine.
3. Mistaken Sources. — Under this head we may point out three
mistaken sources of theology, severally designated as the confes-
sional, the traditional, and the mystical.
A confessional source is omitted by many, but finds a place in
CONFESSIONAL ^hc aualysls and classification of some.' It should be
soi-RCE. noted that where creeds or confessions of faith are
classed as a source of theology they are accounted such only in a
secondary sense. This qualified sense, however, goes beyond the
truth, or, if kept within the truth, loses all proj)er meaning of a
source of theology. In tlie treatment of historical theology we
stated the value of creeds and confessions to systematic theology.
They embody the results of much preparatory work, and furnish
much valuable material ; but they have no authoritative quality,
and therefore cannot be reckoned a source of theology. They
are true or false in doctrine just as they are true or false to
the Scriptures ; and this fact of subordination denies to them
all proper place among the sources of tlieology. Van Ooster-
zee's own explanatory statement really accords with this view:
" The confessional writings of the Church (fons secundarius) can-
not possibly be placed on a line with Holy Scripture, but must, on
the contrary, be tested by, and if necessary altered according to,
this latter. They contain no law for, but are expressions of, the
' Van Oosterzee ; Christmn Dogmatics, \ol. i,i>p. 18-21 ; Smith: Introduction
to Christian Theology, p. 61.
SOURCES OF THEOLOGY. 13
belief wliicli the Christian Church since the earliest times has con-
stantly confessed/' Dr. Smith reaches the same view: '^ Confes-
sions are the voice of the Church, to which Christ promised his
Spirit. But neither experience nor confessions can create new doc-
trines." This limitation denies to confessions any place among the
proper sources of theology. It is better not to place among these
sources any thing which does not possess the quality of a true
source.
In Komanism tradition is held to be co-ordinate with the Script-
ures in matters of faith and morals. This is the doc- traditional
trine decreed by the Council of Trent. " The sacred source.
and holy, oecumenical, and general Synod of Trent, . . . following
the examj)le of the orthodox fathers, receives and venerates with an
equal affection of piety and reverence all the books both of the Old and
of the New Testament — seeing that one God is the author of both
— as also the sacred traditions, as well those pertaining to faith as
to morals, as having been dictated, either by Christ's own word of
mouth or by the Holy Ghost, and j)reserved in the Catholic Church
by a continuous succession." '
Tradition — napddooig — properly means any instruction delivered
from one to another, whether orally or in writing. Within a
proper limitation of time and under favorable conditions even oral
tradition may be of value. It was so in apostolic times and even
later. So Paul exhorted the Christians of Thessalonica to observe
the traditions received from him, whether by word or epistle, and
to withdraw from any who refused this observance.^ The earlier
fathers appealed to apostolic traditions, and might do so with safety
and profit. They were still near the apostles, w^hose sacredly
treasured words might be securely transmitted through the suc-
cession of Christian teachers. But the time-limit of this law v/as
soon passed, and the favoring conditions gave place to perverting
influences ; so that no ground is conceded to the Romish doctrine
of tradition, which makes it co-ordinate with the Scriptures and
asserts its perpetuity through the papacy. '' In coming to a de-
cision on this question every thing depends upon making the proper
distinctions with regard to time. In the first period of Christian-
ity the authority of the apostles was so great that all their doc-
trines and ordinances were strictly and punctually observed by the
churches which they had planted. And the doctrine and discipline
which prevailed in these apostolic churches were, at that time,
justly considered by others to be purely such as the apostles them-
* Schaff : Creeds of Christendom, vol. ii, pp. 79, 80.
2 2 Thess. ii, 15 ; iii, 6.
14 INTRODUCTION.
selves hud taught and established. This was the more common, as
the books of the New Testament had not, as yet, come into general
use among Christians. Nor was it, in that early period, attended
with any special liability to mistake. ... But in later periods
of the Church the circumstances were far dilTerent. After the
commencement of the third century, when the first teachers of
the apostolic churches and their immediate successors had passed
away and another race came on, other doctrines and forms were
gradually introduced, which diHered in many respects from apos-
tolical simplicity. And now these innovators appealed more fre-
quently than had ever been done before to apostolical tradition, in
order to give currency to their own opinions and regulations.
Many at this time did not hesitate, as we find, to plead apostolical
traditions for many things at variance not only with other tradi-
tions, but Avith the very writings of the apostles, which they had
in their hands. From this time forward tradition became natu-
rally more and more uncertain and suspicious." '
Romanism could not trust these traditions to the ordinary mode
of transmission. All trustworthiness would long ago
TRADITION IN- . to &
TRusTEDTo liavc becu lost. As any special rumor, often repeated
INSPIRATION. fpQjjj Qj^Q j-Q another, loses its original character and
certainty, so the apostolic traditions, if transmitted simply by repe-
tition through all Christian centuries, could no longer be trust-
worthy or possess any authority in either doctrines or morals. To
meet this exigency Eomanism assumes for itself an abiding in-
spiration— such an inspiration as rendered the apostles infallible
teachers and perpetuates its own infallibility. Tradition is thus
guarded and guaranteed.'^ This abiding inspiration is now held to
center in the papacy. '' As Peter held the primacy in the circle of
apostles, so the poj)e holds it in the circle of bishops. In the doc-
trine of the primacy the system of Catholicism reaches its climax.
From the Roman chair the apostle is still speaking on whom, ac-
cording to the will of the Lord, his Church was to be built ; here
the Church has an infallible testimony of the truth elevated above
all doubt ; for, as the central organ of inspiration, the pope has
unlimited authority and power to ward off all heresy. In so far as
he speaks ex cathedra his consciousness is a divine-human con-
sciousness, and he is so far vicarius Christi. As Peter once said
to the Redeemer, ' Lord, to whom shall we go ? Thou hast the
words of eternal life,' so all Christendom turns in the same way —
not to Christ, but to the successor of Peter."' Such extravagances
' Knapp : Christian Tlicologij, p. 39.
' Martensen : Christian Dogmatics, p. 28. ' Ibid. , p. 29.
SOURCES OF THEOLOGY. 15
come along with the inspiration which Romanism assumes as the
guarantee of its doctrine of tradition.
The doctrine is open to destructive criticism. There is no
promise of any such inspiration of the ministry that ^^j^j^j^jg^j ^p
should succeed the apostles. There is no evidence of thk romish
any such inspiration in the line of the papacy, but con-
clusive evidence of the contrary. The disproof is in the many
errors of Romanism. If endowed with apostolic inspiration it
could not lapse into error. This is its own doctrine. Yet its
errors are many. There is the apostasy from the Nicene creed into
the Arian heresy. There is the full and hearty acceptance of the
Augustinian theology, and then there are very serious departures
from it. Whether this system is true or false Romanism must
have been in error either in the first case or in the second. The
worship of Mary, transubstantiation, the sacrifice of the mass, the
priesthood of the ministry, the saving efficacy of the sacraments,
purgatory — all these are errors of doctrine and practice in Roman-
ism, and the disproof of its apostolic inspiration.'
The doctrine means the incompleteness and obscurity of the
Scriptures. If tradition is their necessary complement they must
be incomplete and insufficient for the requirements of faith and
duty. Such a view degrades them and openly contradicts the
divine testimony to their sufficiency. The Scriptures are ''profit-
able for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in
righteousness ; that the man of God may be perfect, thoroughly
furnished unto all good works." ^ What need we more? And
these are among the last words of Paul. The doctrine of tradition,
more than all else, leads to a denial of the Scriptures to the people.
The law of this consequence is easily disclosed. If the papacy is
endowed with an infallible inspiration in order to determine and
interpret the apostolic traditions it must be the sole interpreter of
the Scriptures. The one fact follows from the other. There can
be no right of private interpretation in the presence of infallibility.
The people must have no Judgment as to the sense of the Script-
ures. Therefore the people should not have the Scriptures. This
simply completes, in a practical way, the denial of the right of
private judgment. There must be an absolute subjection of the
people to this hierarchy. It is hard to think of any high manliness
or real fitness for civil liberty under such ecclesiastical abjectness.
The detriment to the spiritual life must be great. Religion can no
longer bo viewed as a living union with Christ, but must be viewed
as an outAvard conformity to the requirements of the Church, The
' Hodge : Systematic Theology, vol. i, pp. 144-149. - 3 Tim. iii, 16, 17.
16 INTRODUCTION.
doctrine of infallibility '' must react upon the community in this
way, that the subject may now the more easily think to determine
his obedience to God by his obedience to the Church, its dogmas,
and its morality, and to possess in that way true Christianity.
This has happened, if in different forms, in both the Greek and
Romish communions/" The dismission of this mistaken source
from the position it has so long held would greatly serve the inter-
ests of theology and the Christian life.^
We named mysticism as a third mistaken source of theology. It
MTSTicAL would be more accurate to speak of the source which
SOURCE. mysticism assumes than of itself as such a source.
Mysticism is the doctrine of an immediate insight into truth. This
deeper principle is readily carried into the sphere of religion, which,
indeed, is its special sphere. It is a philosophy in which the mind
seeks repose from the unrest of skepticism. In the view of Cousin
the movement of philosophic thought is through sensationalism
and idealism into skepticism.^ Morell follows him in this view.'
It was no difficult task for Hume and Berkeley to deduce idealism
from sensationalism. Nor was it more difficult for Hume to resolve
idealism into skepticism. But there can be no mental rest in
skepticism. Another philosophy is an imperative requirement.
The next movement is into mysticism. Here truth will stand in
the open vision, especially in the sphere of religion. The imme-
diate insight into truth is through some form of divine illumina-
tion.
Mysticism appears in different forms, and its definitions vary ac-
vARiors FORMS cordlugly. " Whether in the Vedas, in the Platonists,
OF MYSTICISM, or lu thc Hegcliaus, mysticism is nothing more nor less
than ascribing objective existence to the subjective creations of our
own faculties, to ideas or feelings of the mind; and believing that
by watching and contemplating these ideas of its own making it
can read in them what takes place in the world without."' This
may accurately give the principle of mysticism and all the actual
mental facts, but does not give all the assumed facts in its higher
religious forms. In these the mind is divinely illuminated and
lifted above its natural powers, and truth and God are immediately
seen. " Mysticism in philosophy is the belief that God may be
' Dorner : Christian Doctrine, vol. i, p. 83.
'Goode: Divine Rule of Faith and Practice ; Elliott: On Eomanism, vol. i,
chaps, ii-vi.
^ History of Modei'n Philosophrj, vol. i, pp. 343-364.
* Modern Philosophy, Introduction, sec. v.
' Mill : Logic, book v, chap, iii, sec. iv.
SOURCES OF THEOLOGY. 17
known face to face, without any thing intermediate. It is a yield-
ing to the sentiment awakened by the idea of the infinite, and a
running up of all knowledge and all duty to the contemplation and
love of hira." ^ " Mysticism despairs of the regular processes of sci-
ence; it believes that we may attain directly, without the aid of the
senses, and without the aid of reason, by an immediate intuition, the
real and absolute principle of all truth, God. " ' " Mysticism, wheth-
er in religion or philosophy, is that form of error which mistakes for
a divine manifestation the operation of a merely human faculty." '
There are elements of truth in mysticism, while its errors are
mostly by exaggeration. The sensibilities, particularly elemenis of
the moral and religious, have a value for knowledge not truth.
usually accorded them; but when they are exalted above reason and
revelation truth is lost in the exaggeration. This is specially true
of Christian mysticism. There is a communion of the soul with
God, and an activity of religious feeling which is the very life of
that communion. There is a divine illumination which lifts the
soul into a higher capacity for knowing God and truth ; but there
is no new revelation. Mysticism has rendered good service in em-
phasizing the interior spiritual life and the communion of the soul
with God in a conscious experience, but has added nothing to the
ScrijDtures in the form of wholesome doctrine. There is no higher
privilege of the interior spiritual life than the Scriptures clearly
open. Here is the fellowship with the Father, and with his Son
Jesus Christ,* the love and iiidwelling of the Father and the
Son,^ the work of the Sj)irit which gives strength to the inner
man, the indwelling of Christ by faith, the rooting and grounding
of the soul in love, the knowing the love of Christ which passeth
knowledge, the being filled with all the fullness of God.® No
healthful doctrine of the divine communion transcends these privi-
leges. But there is here no promise of a vision of God which shall
supersede the Scriptures or bring higher truth to the soul. There
are promises of divine inspiration as the mode of higher revelations
of truth, but definitely and exclusively to the chosen mediums of
such inspiration and revelation. This, however, is a work of the
Spirit entirely apart from his offices in the personal Christian life,
and, while vital to a divine revelation, means nothing for a state of
personal attainment in the Christian life which shall be the source
of doctrinal truth.
■ Krauth-Fleming : Vocabulary, Mysticism.
^ Cousin : History of Modern Philosoi^hy , vol. ii, p. 114.
" Vaughan : Hours with the Mystics, vol. i, p. 22.
* 1 John i, 3. ^ John xiv, 21, 23. « Eph. iii, 16-19.
3
18 INTRODUCTION.
While we find some good in mysticism we do not find it clear of
ELEMENTS OF ^^'i^' ^^ ^^ ^^^ questioned that mysticism furnishes
KV'L. examples of a pure and elevated Christian life. We
may instance Tauler, Gerson, Boehm, F6nelon, Madame Guyon,
Thomas a Kempis. The Friends have furnished many such exam-
ples. Still, the deeper principles of mysticism easily run into ex-
cesses which are not clear of evil. With the assumption of a spirit-
ual state above the usefulness of reason and revelation, a state in
which the soul is so lost in God as to be wholly subject to his super-
natural guidance, religious feeling may readily be kindled to in-
tensity, when the prudence and wisdom which should ever rule the
Christian life must sink beneath a rashness and arrogance of spirit
which easily run into evil excesses. The tendency is, on the one
hand, to a reckless fanaticism; on the other, to a quietism, a state
of absorbing contemplation or religious reverie, quite apart from the
practical duties of the Christian life. In the extremer forms of
mysticism, and forms not unnatural to its deeper principles, it has
sometimes run into the impious heresy of antinomianism. Mys-
ticism is in no true sense a source of theology. '
4. Concerning tlie Christian Co7isciotisness. — The question is
whether the Christian consciousness is in any proper sense a source
of theology. Those who assume the affirmative differ widely re-
sjiecting the measure in which it is such a source. Some claim so
little as scarcely to reach the idea of a source of theology, while
others make religious feeling the norm and source of the whole
system of doctrines.
In the moderate view it is held that certain facts of Christian
THE MODERATE Gxperiencc witness to the truth of certain correlate
■^lEw. tenets of doctrine. For instance, it is claimed that in
Christian experience there is the consciousness of a sinful nature
which deserves penal retribution, and, therefore, that the doctrine
of such a form of native sinfulness is true. Such an argument
often appears in the interest of the Augustinian anthropology. But
no source of theology is thus reached. Such a form of sinfulness,
even if a reality, could not directly become a fact of consciousness.
The philosophy of consciousness so decides. There might still be
the moral conviction that inherited depravity is of the very nature
of sin, but only after the doctrine of such a form of sin is placed in
one's creed. In this case the moral conviction would simj^ly be the
response of the conscience to the moral judgment embodied in the
' Joiiffroy ; Introduction to Ethics, vol. i, lect. v ; Cousin : The True, the
Beautiful, and the Good, lect. v ; Morell : Modei'n Philosophy, part ii, chap,
vii ; Vaughan : Hours with the Mystics.
SOURCES OF THEOLOGY. 19
creed. But a doctrine which must precede a particular form of
consciousness as its necessary condition cannot even find its proof,
much less its source, in such a consciousness. What is true in this
case is equally true in all like cases.
We are more concerned with the stronger view of the religious
consciousness as related to theology. This view is of „,^„„„ ^^„„
<-''' _ _ HIGHER FORM
comparatively recent development, and has its chief of the doc-
representation in Schleiermacher. "It is only in the ™^^^-
present century, and chiefly through the influence of Schleier-
macher, that the Christian consciousness began to be considered
a source of dogmatics. He started with his investigation from
man's feeling of his unlimited dependence. Dogma is for him
the development of the utterances of the pious self-conscious-
ness, as this is found in every Christian, and is still more de-
termined by the opposition between sin and grace. In other
words, it is the scientific expression of the pious feeling which
the believer, upon close self-examination, perceives in his heart.
Thus this consciousness is here the gold-mine from which the
dogmas must be dug out, in order to 'found' them afterward,
as far as possible, in Holy Scripture. In the individu.al it is the
result of the spirit of the community, as this is a revelation
of the Spirit of Christ. Of this ' Gemeingeist ' Schleiermacher
allows, it is true, that it must continually develop and strengthen
itself by the words of Scripture, but not that it must find in the
latter its infallible correcting rule. For him the highest principle
of Christian knowledge is thus something entirely subjective, and
the autonomy of his self -consciousness is the basis of his entire sys-
tem."' This citation' is valuable, not only in its historic aspect,
but specially as a statement of the stronger view of the Christian
consciousness as a source of theology.
There is a Christian consciousness. This is not a mere specula-
tion, but a fact of experience. The conditions of this
' J^_ _ . ,LAWOFTHE
consciousness are obvious. It is clearly impossible christian
without the central truths of Christianity. No soul consciousness.
ever reached it, or ever can reach it, through reason or the light of
nature. It is impossible under any other form of religion. In
every state of consciousness respecting any objective truth or real-
ity, such truth or reality must be mentally apprehended before
there can be any such response of the sensibilities as shall consti-
tute the state of consciousness. This law conditions the active
state of the sensibilities; and it is only in their active state that
they can have any place in consciousness. In any such state of
' Van Gosterzee : Christian Dogmatics, vol. i, pp. 23, 23.
20 INTRODUCTION.
love, hatred, resentment, hope, fear, sympathy, or reverence the
proper object must be present to thought as in perception or in
some form of mental representation. This is the invariable and
necessary order of the facts : first, the mental apprehension of ob-
jective truths or realities; and, second, the response of the sensi-
bilities in active forms of feeling, according to the character of
their respective objects as mentally viewed. The religious sensi-
bilities are subject to the same laws.
We may view the religious consciousness as far broader than the
Christian. In this view the latter is a specific type of
VARIATIONS OF • .
THE RELioions tlic formcr. There are, indeed, many specific types, as
CONSCIOUS- j^av readily be seen in the religions of the world. There
NESS. . .
are variations of the religious consciousness, according
to the variations of these religions. We may instance Confucianism,
Brahmanism, Buddhism, Zoroastrianism, Mohammedanism, Juda-
ism ; each has its own appropriate form of the religious conscious-
ness. The Christian consciousness differs widely from each of the
others. There are also differences in the Christian consciousness,
as between Eomauism and Protestantism, Trinitarianism and Uni-
tarianism, Calvinism and Arminiauism. The question is to account
for such differences. The real point is that they cannot be ac-
counted for on any theory which makes religious feeling the source
of theology, and, further, that the true account disproves such a
source.
The theory which makes religious feeling the source of theology
places the feeling before the ideas or truths which constitute the
theology. In this order of the facts, instead of the doctrines deter-
mining the cast of the feeling, the feeling determines the form and
content of the doctrines. If this be the case religious feeling musi
be purely spontaneous to our nature, neither evoked nor modified
by any religions ideas or doctrinal views. It is itself the norm and
ruling principle of religion. Why then should it so vary in the
forms of its development ? The theory can make no answer to this
question. It allows nothing back of this feeling Avhich can deter-
mine these variations. Their explanation must come from the op-
LAw OF THESE positc positioii. Thc religious consciousness varies in
VARIATIONS, the different forms of religion because they differ in the
tenets of doctrine. Tlicre are different views of God and man, of
duty and destiny. These views act upon the feelings and deter-
mine the cast of the religious consciousness. A thorough analysis
of these religions will find in each a form of consciousness in accord
with its doctrines. The doctrinal view of God is specially a deter-
mining force in the religious consciousness. So far from this con-
SOURCES OF THEOLOGY. 21
sciousness determining the view of Grod just tlie contrary is the truth ;
the view of God determines the east of the consciousness. ' The
Christian consciousness is peculiar to Christianity and impossible to
any other form of religion, because many of its doctrines, particu-
larly in the fullness of their unfolding, are peculiar to itself. Only
in this manner can we explain the variations of the Christian con-
sciousness as previously noted. Eomanism and Protestantism,
Trinitarianism and Unitarianism, Calvinism and Arminianism, dif-
fer in ruling doctrines, doctrines to which the religious feelings
respond, and from the influence of which they receive their own
cast. This is the law of variations in the Christian consciousness.
In view of the facts above given the conditions of the Christian
consciousness are manifest. There is no possibility of the feelings
which constitute this consciousness without the central truths of
Christianity. These truths must not only be in the mental appre-
hension, but must also be accepted in faith. Only thus can they
have power in the religious consciousness. "When so apprehended
and believed, they have such power because they are thus seen to be
truths of profound interest. Now the religious nature responds to
them in appropriate forms of feeling. This is the law of the
Christian consciousness in the general view, and of its variations in
different schools of theology. To assume the religious feelings as
first in order, and then to find in them the central truths
', , REVERSION OF
of theology, is to reverse the logical and necessary order the true or-
of the facts. Clearly a knowledge of the central truths "^^"
of Christianity conditions the Christian consciousness and must be
first in order. It may still be true, and indeed is true, that we more
fully grasp these truths of doctrine through the response of the re-
ligious sensibilities, but this simply concerns our capacity for the
clearest knowledge, and has nothing to do with the fixed order of the
facts in the Christian consciousness.
As the Christian consciousness is thus conditioned by the posses-
sion of the central truths of Christian theology, it is impossible to
deduce these truths from that consciousness. Back of these truths
there is no Christian consciousness to begin with. The theory
under review tacitly admits this by beginning, back of this specific
form of consciousness, simply with religious feeling, the feeling of
absol^^te dependence upon God. But there is no source of Christian
theology in such a feeling. It has no content from which may be
deduced the doctrine of the Trinity, the Christian doctrine of sin,
the atonement in Christ, justification by faith, or regeneration and
* Walker : PhUosophy of the Plan of Salvation. Miley : " The Idea of God as
a Law of Eeligious Development," Methodist Quarterly Review, January, 1865.
22 INTRODUCTION.
a new spiritual life through the agency of the Holy Spirit. There
is apologetic value in the Christian consciousness, but no source of
Christian theology. "■ To the Christian truth, in accordance with
the Gospel believed and confessed by the Church, the Christian con-
sciousness gives a witness, with reason estimated highly. Only
when objective truth finds a point of contact in the subjective con-
sciousness docs it become the spiritual property of mankind, and
can it be thus properly understood anJ valued. So far, and so far
only, does the Christian consciousness deserve a place among the
sources of dogmatics. But since the doctrine of salvation can be
derived neither from reason, nor from feeling, nor from conscience,
and the internal consciousness only attests and confirms the truth,
after having learned it from Scrij^ture, this last must always be
valued as the principal source." '
III. SciEXTiFic Basis of Theology.
1. Certitude a Requirement of Science. — " Science is knowledge
evident and certain in itself, or by the principles from which it is
deduced, or with which it is certainly connected."^ Any proper
definition of science Avill carry with it the sense of certitude. This
certitude has special respect to the facts in which a science is
grounded, or to the principles upon which it is constructed. There
is a distinction of sciences, as intimated in the previous sentence.
It is the distinction between the experimental, or inductive, and the
exact, or deductive, as the mathematical. The latter are constructed
upon principles. These principles are axiomatic and, therefore,
certain in their own light. If these principles are taken into exact
and clear thought, and all the deductions are legitimate, certitude
goes with the scientific construction. The facts in which the em-
pirical sciences are grounded are very different from such principles.
They are facts to be studied by observation and the tests of experi-
ment. They must be surely and accurately known before they can
be wrought into a science. But a mere knowledge of facts, how-
ever exact and full, is not in itself a science. There must still be a
generalization in some principle or law which interprets the facts,
and which they fully verify. Such is the method in this class of
sciences. It is no absolute guarantee against mistakes in respect to
either the facts or the generalization, but must be observed for any
scientific attainment. The history of science records many mis-
takes, and mistakes still occur ; so that some things called science
'Van Oosterzee: Christian Dogmatics, vol. i, p. 22. We highly commend
the troatment of this question by the author just cited.
^ Krauth-Fleming : Vocabulai-y, '^Science."
SCIENTIFIC BASIS OF THEOLOGY. 23
are falsely so called. In such cases the boasted certitude is bald
assumption.
If theology is to receive a scientific construction, it must possess
the requisite grounds of certitude. This does not mean necessary in
that its grounds must be precisely the same as in the theology.
abstract sciences, or in the experimental sciences, but must mean a
measure of certitude sufficient for the scientific construction. With-
out such a ground there can be no attainment of science in the-
ology. " Besides, certainty upon Christian grounds has no wish to
withdraw from those universal rules and laws, according to which a
legitimate certainty is formed ; were it otherwise. Christian theology
could be no longer represented as a branch in the series of human
sciences.'" The several doctrines might be legitimate to the ac-
cepted facts or grounds on which they are constructed, and also
in such accord with each other as to meet the logical requirements
for systemization, but without the requisite certainty in the grounds
there could still be no true science of theology.
2. Uiiivarranted Limitation to Empirical Facts. — Science is often
BO defined as to deny to theology all rightful claim to a scientific
position. The definition limits science to purely empirical facts, on
the assumption that only such facts have the certitude requisite to
scientific treatment. "Students of the physical sci- narrow aim
ences have accustomed themselves of late to limit the o^ scientists.
word science exclusively to empirical science, and even, in some
cases, to the empirical grade of physical science. Thus Professor
Simon Newcomb, in his address before the American Scientific As-
sociation in 1878, said : ' Science concerns itself only with phenom-
ena and the relations which connect them, and does not take ac-
count of any question which does not in some way admit of being
brought to the test of observation.^ This, he says, is ^fundamental
in the history of modern science.' Even so considerate and philo-
sophical a writer as Janet says : ' Doubtless philosophical thought
mingles always more or less with science, especially in the sphere
of organized being ; but science rightly strives to disengage itself
more and more from it, and to reduce the problem to relations capa-
ble of being determined by experience.'* This is a legitimate
characteristic and aim of empirical science, but it has no right to
appropriate to itself exclusively the name of science and to distin-
guish itself from philosophy and theology. This abuse of the word
is, however, becoming common. The three grades are habitually
designated as science, philosophy, and theology, implying that the
two latter are not science. There is a mighty power in words, and
' Dorner : Christian Doctrine, vol. i, p. 59. ^ Final Causes, p. 117.
24 INTRODUCTION.
it is an nnworthy artifice for the students of j)hysical science to
appropriate to their own branch of study the name science, and to
themselves the name scientists. They can justify this only by re-
verting to the complete positivism of Comte and avowing and
maintaining that knowledge is limited to the observations made
by the senses.''^'
The limitation of science to facts of observation or experience
must be made upon the assumption that only such facts
TRUTH BROAD- ^ , '■ ^ •'
ER THAN EX- cau bc sufiicicntly known for scientific treatment. But
PERiE.NCE. 6ense-exj)erience is not the limitation of thought, and
thought must transcend it in order to any attainment of science.
Perception transcends experience. Experience is through sensa-
tion ; perception tlirough the cognitive activity of thought. Phe-
nomenalism is the utmost attainment of mere empiricism. All
science lies beyond this limit. The relations of j^henomena neces-
sary to science are not given in sensation. Mucli less are the laws
or 23i*inciples which underlie and interpret phenomena so given.
These principles can be reached only through the activities of
rational thought. No scientific classification is possible without
the processes of abstraction and generalization. These processes
are the office of the discursive or logical facult}', not of the pre-
sentative faculty as concerned with empirical facts. The sensation-
alism which underlies and determines this narrov/ sense of science
is mere iDlienomenalism, mere positivism, which knows nothing of
substance, cause, or law. The legitimate result is an utter skep-
ticism, and an exclusion of all the certitude of truth necessary to
science.
Empirical knowledge, or knowledge acquired by observation or
experience, is purely individual. This fact has not
ENCE ptinELY been properly emphasized, especially in its relation to
this narrow limitation of science to facts empirically
known. Its consequence is that every scientist is limited to the
facts of his own individual observation or testing. K"o facts can
be taken on testimony, however competent the witnesses. Testi-
mony addresses itself to faith, not to a testing experience. This
result is determined by the laws of mind, not by the nature of the
facts concerned in the testimony. Hence empirical facts are no
exception. If presented only on testimony they can be received
only in faith. This narrow sense of science, with its fixed empir-
ical limitations, has no place for faith, and must exclude it as openly
contradictory to its own principles. Moreover, its admission would
be a fatal concession to theology, in wliich faith has so im^Jortant a
' Ilarris : Philosophical Basis of Theism, pp. 300, 301.
SCIENTIFIC BASIS OF THEOLOGY. 25
function. Hence we emphasize this fact, that on the truth of any
principle which determines the limitation of science to facts of ob-
servation or experience all empirical knowledge available for sci-
ence is strictly individual. As the observation or experience of
no one can become the observation or experience of another, so the
empirically acquired knowledge of no one can be of any scientific
use to another. The scientific work of each must proceed only with
his own empirical acquirement and within its determining limitation.
Now, with these narrow limits let any one attempt the con-
struction of a science — whether of cosmogony, geology,
° J^O bJ J SERIOUS
biology, or astronomy, it matters not. Is any one j)os- trouble for
sible under the limitation to empirical facts as actually ^^^'p'^^^cists.
known in observation or experience ? Especially is any one pos-
sible with the inevitable limitation to a mere individual observation
or experience ? Are the facts necessary to the verification of the
nebular cosmogony empirically known to any single mind ? Are
the facts necessary to a science of geology, or to a science of biology,
so known ? There is no true science of astronomy without the
great law of gravitation. This law, however, is no emj)irical truth,
but a rational deduction from certain observed facts. The law of
its attractive force expressed in the formula, directly as the mass
and inversely as the square of the distance, is reached only in
rational thought which transcends experience. Yet astronomy,
with all the confidence of scientific certainty, asserts the reign of
gravitation, according to this law of its energy, over the physical uni-
verse, and therefore over measureless portions which lie infinitely
beyond the observed facts from which it is inferred, and equally
beyond the possible tests of experience.
And what shall be done with mathematics on this empirical lim-
itation of science ? Mathematics is not an empirical science. The
axiomatic principles on which it builds are open only to the in-
tuition of thought, not to the sight of the eye or the touch of the
finger. They are subject to no tests. That parallel lines cannot
inclose a space, and that all the radii of a circle are equal, are ab-
solute truths for thought, but truths which can never be empirically
verified. What, then, can these empirical limitationists do with
mathematics ? Perhaps nothing better than to go with Comte
and give it a mere phenomenal character. But in doing this they
should not forget that the j)henomenal is purely for sense-percep-
tion, while mathematics is purely for thought, and therefore with-
out any phenomenal quality. The only other alternative is to deny
to mathematics any place in the category of the sciences. Either
result utterly discredits this narrow empiricism.
26 INTRODUCTION.
Certain positions are thus surely gained. One is that the lim-
»,« r-w„,n,.,., itations of science to facts of sense-experience renders
LIMITATIONS science impossible. This limitation assumes that only
SCI -.set. gucij facts are sufficiently known or certain for scien-
tific use. But tliis assumption is inevitably grounded in sensation-
alism, which logically results in skepticism, and therefore excludes
the certitude necessary to science. Hence, as we have seen, thought
must transcend all sense-experience and be valid in its own light
in order to any scientific attainment. Another is that empirical
grounds are wholly unnecessary to the most exact and certain forms
of science, as appears above question in the instance of mathe-
matics. It follows that theology must not be denied, and cannot
logically be denied, a scientific position simply because it is not
grounded in empirical facts in the manner of the physical sciences.
Science has no such limitation.'
3. Grounds of Certitude in Tlieology. — Here two questions
arise : "What are the grounds of theology ? and. Do these grounds
possess the certitude requisite to a science of theology ? However,
it is not important to the present treatment to hold the two in en-
tire separation. Nor do we need a full discussion of all the matters
concerned in these questions. This would be quite impracticable
and out of the order of a proper method. Such a discussion would
involve the whole question of theism, which properly forms a dis-
tinct part of theology. It would also include the whole question
of Christian apologetics, which is no necessary part of systematic
theology.
The first truth of theology is the existence of God. Without
CERTAINTY OF this trutli tlicrc is no theology in any proper sense of
THEISM. w-^Q term, and therefore no place for a science of theol-
ogy. As we have previously seen, in the broadened sense of theol-
ogy many other truths are included than those relating directly to
God, but his existence is ever the ground-truth, and these other
truths receive their theological cast from their relation to him.
The proofs of the existence of God will be considered in the proper
place. In the light of reason they are conclusive and give cer-
tainty to this ground-truth of theology. In the light of reason, as
reason interprets nature and man, the existence of God is a more
certain truth than the existence of a physical universe as studied in
the light of sensationalism — that favorite philosophy with the em-
pirical scientists who deny to theology the position of a science.
More philosophic thinkers have questioned the truth of the latter
than the truth of the former. The existence of God is a more
' Bowne : Philosophy of Theism, p. 102.
SCIENTIFIC BASIS OF THEOLOGY. 27
certain truth than the great law of gravitation which underlies the
science of astronomy. With the existence of God, the harmony of
the heavens can be explained without the law of gravitation. With-
out his existence, neither this harmony nor the manifold adjust-
ments of nature can be explained.
There is a theological anthropology which deals with the relig-
ious nature of man and its manifestations in human
THEOLOGICAL
history. Man is a religious being. He is such by the anthropol-
constitution of his nature. This is rarely questioned ^^^'
by philosophic thinkers. The purpose of infidelity to eliminate
religion from human life is a thing of the past. Eeal thinkers of
the present have no such aim nor any thought of its possibility.
Naturalistic evolutionists must admit, and do admit, that nothing in
the constitution of man is more thoroughly organic than his relig-
ious nature. With no other characteristic is human history more
thoroughly replete. "An unbiased consideration of its general as-
pects forces us to conclude that religion, every-where jDresent as a weft
running through the warj) of human history, expresses some eternal
fact." ' '' No atheistic reasoning can, I hold, dislodge religion from
the heart of man." ''The facts of religious feeling are to me as
certain as the facts of physics."^ The facts of religious feeling are
facts of consciousness, just as any other facts of consciousness in
our mental life, and therefore just as certain as any others. But
the facts of consciousness are even more certain than the facts of
physics or the properties of matter.
The facts of our religious nature, thus clear and certain in the
consciousness and ever manifest in human historv,
•^ ' FACTS FOR
must be open to scientific treatment. The certitude theological
requisite to such treatment is above question, and fully ^^'"^n^^-
conceded. As no facts of our mental life and no facts of physics
are either more certain or more distinct and definite than the relig-
ious, we must either concede a scientific position to the latter or
deny it to the former. This is the imperative requirement of con-
sistency. Hence, any objection to a scientific treatment of the
facts of man's religious nature must be made, not against such
treatment itself, but against its theological significance. Empir-
ical scientists announce the purpose and expectation of extending
the laws of physical nature over the realms of life and mind.' On
this assumption all phenomena, vital, mental, religious, just as
the material, must proceed according to physical laws and as the
1 Spencer : First Princiijles, p. 20.
' Tyndall : Prefaces to the Belfast Address.
^ Huxley : Lay Sermons, p. 138 ; Tyndall : Belfast Address, p. 55.
28 INTRODUCTION.
effect of mechanical forces. The result must be accepted as the
true science of mind, even in its highest rational and religious facts.
If this aim is ever achieved the rational and religious facts of mind
must yield to an empirical testing, just as the facts of physical
nature. They never can be so tested. They are facts for philo-
sophic treatment, and philosophy will never yield them to the
physical realm, but ever assert for them a distinct and higher
ground in s})iritual mind. The failure of empirical science to
bring these moral and religious facts into the order of physical phe-
nomena neither affects their reality nor changes their distinct and
definite form as facts of consciousness and historic manifestation.
As such facts, they are open to scientific treatment in the light of
philosophy, and have a profound significance for tlieology. In its
anthropological sphere theology deals, not with fancies, but with
what is most real and definite in the constitution and history of
man.
As the Scriptures are the chief source of theology they must be
grounded in truth in order to the certitude Avhich a
CERTITUDE IN ^
THE SCRIPT- science of tlieology requires. The issue is not shunned
^^^'^' at this point. It is not shunned in the instance of
theologians who proceed to the scientific treatment of doctrines
without an introductory verification of the Scriptures. In such
case they proceed on the warranted ground that already this veri-
fication has been frequently and fully achieved. This is a thor-
oughly legitimate method, and a very common one in many branches
of science. One man furnishes facts, or what he reports to be
facts, as found in his own observation or testing; anotlier accepts
them as such and proceeds to generalize them in some principle or
law of science. If there is no error respecting either the facts or
the generalization, the result is just as valid as if one person per-
formed the whole work. When one deals with such facts at second
hand the only requirement is that they be so accredited as to
possess the certitude requisite to their scientific use. This method
is equally valid for the theologian. Still, he does not proceed sim-
ply ujjon the testimony of others, however competent, that they
have thoroughly examined the evidences in the case and found
them conclusive of a divine original of the Scriptures; he examines
for himself, and to himself proves their divine verity before pro-
ceeding to the scientific treatment of their doctrinal contents. AVith
the omission of this discussion from any actual place in his theology,
his method is still far more exact and thorough than in many in-
stances of scientists in secular branches, who hastily accept facts at
second hand and proceed without any proper warrant of the certi-
SCIENTIFIC BASIS OF THEOLOGY. 29
tude requisite to their scientific use. Further information has
often brought confusion to the hasty generalizations thus reached.
If the Scriptures are a divine revehition it follows, of course, that
their doctrinal contents possess all the certitude requisite to a
science of theology. Hovv-ever, in view of the facts above given
we may pass this whole question with a very summary statement,
especially as some points must recur with the treatment of faith in
relation to a science of theology.
On the ground of theism a divine revelation is possible. The
only reason for asserting so manifest a truth is that it possibility of
has been disputed. The question maybe appealed to a revelation.
reported facts of Scripture without the assumption of their truth,
which, indeed, is not directly concerned in the present issue.
This is claimed as manifestly true, that on the ground of theism
God's intercourse with men as related in the Scriptures is certainly
possible. He could commune with Moses in all the modes related,
and communicate to him all the truth claimed to have been so given.
So, by word and dream and vision and inspiration, he could give
truth to the prophets and identify it as from himself. They could
thus be the medium of divine revelations and the unerring proph-
ets of a far-reaching future. On the same ground the divine in-
carnation is entirely possible; and the Son so present with men
could reveal the Father and communicate the great truths of relig-
ion which lie in the gospels. All the reported instances of his in-
tercourse with his disciples and his religious instructions to them
are possible. The promised mission of the Spirit as a revealer of
religious truth in the minds of its chosen messengers is possible.
The same Spirit, in the fulfillment of this mission, could secure
through them the jiroper utterance and record of the truths so
revealed. The conclusion is the possibility of a divine revelation.
Sometimes the objection to the possibility of a divine revelation
takes a specially subtle form. It proceeds on the as- a subtle ob-
sumption that our purely subjective ideas are the full Jection.
measure of our spiritual cognitions. Hence no communication
from without can transcend these subjective limitations. Nothing,
therefore, in the form of religious truth can be added by revelation
to what we already knoAv. The fallacy of this objection lies in the
tacit assumption that our subjective state is without any possible
improvement whereby we may grasp higher forms of truth given by
instruction. A little testing will expose this fallacy. No such law
of subjective limitation renders fruitless instruction in science or
art. No such law rules the sphere of ethics or bars all improve-
ment of moral ideas through instruction. The moral and religious
30 INTRODUCTION.
instructions of the mother are not rendered powerless by any fixed
limitation imposed by the subjective ideas of her child. In in-
stances without niimber heathen minds have been raised to higher
ideas of God and truth through Christian instruction. No such
law precludes the possibility of a divine revelation. God is not
bound by the limitations of our purely subjective ideas. He can
communicate truth which shall marvelously clear these ideas, and,
with an ever-growing power of spiritual perception, ever give us
more truth and light.
On the ground of theism a divine revelation is rationally prob-
pROBABiLiTY ^^^^' This propositiou looks only to an antecedent
OFARKVKLA- probability. Hence it must not be maintained by any
'^^^^' rational claim of the Scriptl^res to a divine original,
but find its support in considerations quite apart from such claim.
A few may be briefly stated:
God is benevolently concerned for our well-being. As infinitely
wise and good, as our Creator and Father, he must care for our
moral and spiritual good.
We are the subjects of a moral government of God's own ordina-
tion and administration. The truth of this position is affirmed
by the suffrage of mankind, though not always with the concep-
tion of its highest theistic ideas. The human soul, with rarest
exceptions, asserts its own sense of moral responsibility to a divine
Ruler. This common affirmation must be accepted as the expres-
sion of a profound reality. On the ground of theism its truth
cannot be questioned.
The highest moral and religious truth is profoundly important.
As our secular interests render an accurate and full knowledge of
nature and of the arts and sciences which concern our present
well-being very desirable, so that truth which is necessary to our
moral and spiritual good must be intensely desirable. This de-
sirableness rises with the infinite measure of the interests which
such truth concerns.
The highest certainty of religious truth is profoundly desirable.
Doubtful truths do not meet the conscious needs of the soul. "We
need truth as truth is with God, and as revealing his mind and
will. His mind is the only sufficient source of spiritual truth, and
it must deeply concern us to know the behests of his will. Hence
the desirableness of truth known to have come from God. The
heart of humanity craves such truth. The history of mankind
reveals this craving.
We can have no such religious truth as the world needs and
craves, truth in the highest form and certainty, except as a divine
SCIENTIFIC BASIS OF THEOLOGY. 31
revelation. The case may be appealed to the history of the race,
and in view of the profoundest questions of religious interest and
concern. Apart from the Scriptures, or on a denial of their divine
original, we have no such full and certain knowledge as we need re-
specting either God or ourselves, or his will and the duties of love
and obedience that we should render him, or the means of relief
from the burden of sin which all hearts bear, or the graces of the
purest, best life. The best minds of the race have deeply felt these
wants and avowed the conviction that such truth and light could
come to man only as a revelation from heaven.
A divine revelation is, therefore, a rational probability. The
facts iust considered so affirm. On the one hand we ^ „ ^, „ . „ ^ „
J _ _ THE FACTS
have the character of God and his relations to us; on show the
the other, our own profound need of religious truth — probability.
truth of such fullness and certainty that its only possible mode of
attainment is in a divine revelation. It is therefore rationally prob-
able that God shall in some mode above the light of nature or the
resources of human reason reveal himself to men. He has placed
the sun in the heavens as a light for the natural world; and has he
no divine light for the moral world? Must each soul be its own
and only prophet? Shall no one sent from God speak to us?
Shall the heavenly Father, veiled from the eye of his children, be
forever silent to their ear? Shall he never speak to the world so
long waiting and listening for his voice?
A revelation is possible only through a supernatural agency of
God. Any manifestation of religious truth in the
works of nature or the moral constitution of man may § trpER™AT^
be called a revelation, but only in a popular sense. In ^Ral commu-
such case there is no direct communication of truth
from God, but only the discovery of truth by human faculties. If
we even assume a divine illumination of human minds, the result
would be simjDly a clearing of their spiritual vision, but no other
disclosure of truth than in the works of God. The true idea of a
divine revelation carries with it the sense of a direct communica-
tion of truth through the agency of God. That agency must be
supernatural, whatever the modes in which it works. There are
doctrinal contents of Christianity which have no manifestation in
nature, and therefore could never be discovered or known as
truths, except as attested communications from God. We may in-
stance the doctrine of the Trinity, the doctrine of sin in its more
distinctive facts, the divine incarnation, the personality of Christ,
the atonement in Christ, Justification by faith, the mission and
work of the Holy Spirit. As these central and essential truths of
32 INTRODUCTION.
Christianity can be known as truths only as attested communica-
tions through a supernatural agency of God, we must accept and
maintain such an agency in the original of the Scriptures, wherein
we find these truths; for only thus can we secure the certitude
requisite to a science of theology which has its chief source in the
Scriptures.
On tlie ground of theism such a supernatural agency has no
THE supKR- serious perplexity for rational thought; indeed, it is
NATURAL Qpen and clear as compared with any account of mate-
AGENCY WITH- .^ ^ ''
OUT PERPLEX- nal and mental phenomena on the ground of purely
"^' mechanical forces. There are greater perplexities in
the science of physics than in the theory of a supernatural agency
of God in a revelation of religious truths. Who can explain the
forces of chemical affinity, or the strength of cohesion as exempli-
fied in the steel cables which support the Brooklyn Bridge? The
reciprocal attraction of the earth and the sun across the vast space
which separates them seems very simjjle in idea, but it has no ra-
tionale in human thought. The perplexity ever deepens as we ex-
tend the reign of this law over the physical universe. There is no
seeming possibility of any such mechanical force. This is the real
point of perplexity. No such perplexity besets the theory of a su-
pernatural agency of God in a revelation of religious truth. Such
an agency is not only free from valid objections, but has the sup-
port of weighty reasons. All the facts which render a divine reve-
lation rationally probable render equally probable a supernatural
agency as the necessary mode of its communication.
A divine revelation must be supernaturally attested. There is
here a profound distinction between its primary recipi-
RAL ATTESTA- Guts aud tlic mauy to whom they publish it. To the
TioN NECKS- former it may be verified as a revelation in the mode of
SARY. , _ '' ,
its communication ; but this will not answer for the many
who receive it on their testimony. Its chosen messengers must be
accredited in a manner assuring to the people that they are messen-
gers of truth from God. Miracles are the best, and rationally the
most probable, means to this end. Prophecy is just as supernatural,
and its fulfillment just as conclusive of a divine commission, but
often there must be long waiting before the fulfillment completes
this credential. Prophecy has great apologetic value, especially for
the generations succeeding the founding of Christianity, but this
necessary delay prevents the prompt and direct attestation fur-
nished by miracles. A revelation may have the support of many
forms of evidence, as the Scriptures have, while it is still true that
miracles are the most appropriate credential of its messengers.
SCIENTIFIC BASIS OF THEOLOGY. 33
There is no credulity in the ready belief that the religious teacher
who works miracles in the name of God is his messenger of truth to
men.' The reason for this faith was never clearer or surer than
now. Just as science establishes the uniformity of the laws of nat-
ure, so does a supernatural event absolutely evince the immediate
agency of God as its cause. Hence the religious teacher by whoir
he works miracles must be his messenger of truth to men.
On' the ground of theism there is no antecedent presumption
against miracles, but, rather, a strong presumption in
their favor. We have previously pointed out the ante- tion against
cedent rational probability of a divine revelation. *'"^^*^'''^s-
There is a like probability of miracles as the appropriate and really
necessary attestation of such a revelation. Unwise definitions have
needlessly furnished occasion for objections to such a mode of at-
testation. While nothing of the necessary content of a miracle
should be omitted from its definition, nothing unnecessary should
be included. A miracle does not mean any abrogation or suspen-
sion of the laws of nature. Yet such ideas have often been put
into its definitions, which have thus furnished the special ground
of objection. A miracle is a supernatural event wrought by the
immediate agency of God, to accredit some messenger as divinely
3ommissioned or some truth as divinely given. The divine ener-
gizing touches the law of nature simply at the point of the miracle,
and in a manner to produce it, but no more abrogates or suspends
such law, as a law of nature, than the casting a stone into the air
annuls the law of gravitation. The raising of Lazarus leaves un-
disturbed the laws of nature which reign over the vast realms of the
living and the dead. The agency of God in a miracle, while thor-
oughly supernatural, is just as orderly with respect to the laws of
nature as the agency of man in the use of any chemical or mechan-
ical force. Hence all such objections are utterly void."
The facts thus maintained have apologetic value, not, however,
as direct proofs of a divine revelation, but specially as objections
obviating leading objections and clearing the way for the obviated.
full force of the evidences of such a revelation. We have not the
more difficult task of facing any strong presumption against either
its possibility or probability. On the ground of theism, a divine
' John iii, 2. ,
^ Butler : Analogy, part ii, chap, ii ; Mozley : Miracles, lect. i ; Bushnell :
Nature and the Siqjernatui-al, chap, xi ; Paley : Evidences of Christianity,
" Preparatory Considerations ; " Mansell : Aids to Faith, essay i : Christlieb :
Modern Doubt and Christian Belief, lect. v ; Foster : The Supernatural Book,
" Argument from Miracles."
4
84 INTRODUCTION.
revelation is clearly possible and strongly probable, while a super-
natural agency of God as the necessary mode of its communication
fully shares the probability. Further, there is not only no anteced-
ent presumption against miracles, but as the best means of attest-
ing a divine revelation they are rationally probable. Thus the
evidences of such a revelation do not encounter any balancing, or
nearly balancing, disproof, so that they really prove nothing, or, at
best, leave the question in uncertainty : they come to the proof of
what is antecedently probable, and their whole weight is available
for this end. The certitude requisite to a science of theology is
thus attainable.
The Holy Scriptures are a divine revelation of religious truth.
On this question Christian apologetics has shunned no
EFFECTIVE ^. . .
WORK OP issue with infidelity. Against the many forms of at-
tack the defense has been prompt and effective. The
victory is with the defenders of the Christian faith. Beyond this
defensive service the evidences for the truth and divine original of
the Scriptures have been presented in their fullness and logical
conclusiveness. The authenticity of the Scriptures is an established
truth. The fulfillment of the prophecies and the reality of the
miracles infallibly accredit the sacred writers as messengers of truth
from God. The complete harmony of the sacred books, occupying,
as they do, so many centuries in their composition, and the peculiar
character of their doctrinal, moral, and religious contents unite in
the same attestation. The founding and triumphant propagation of
Christianity as open facts of history, together with its marvelous
power in the moral and religious life of mankind, for any rational
account absolutely require the divine mission of the Christ. The
unique character of our Lord as portrayed in the New Testament is
itself conclusive of the divine origin of Christianity. Only Avith a
pattern from the holy mount of God could the human mind rise to
the conception of such a character. In all the creative thought of
the world there is no approach toward such a conception. The
simple artists of the New Testament who wrought this portrait
must have had the divine original before them. '
' On the truth of Christianity, with the truth of the Scriptures — Paley : The
Evidences of Christianity ; Mair : Studies in Christian Evidences ; Wilson : Evi-
dences of Christianity ; Fisher: Supernatural Origin of Christianity ; Keith:
Demonstration of the Truth of Christianity ; Bishop Thomson : Evidences of
Revelation ; Hopkins : Evidences of Christianity ; Eawlinson : Historical Evi-
dences of the Ti~iith of the SciHpture Records ; Chahners : Evidences of Christian-
ity ; Rogers : Superhuman Origin of the Bible ; Alexander : Evidences of Chris-
tianity; Christlieb : Modem Doubt and Christian Belief; Aids to Eaith —
Relies to '^Essays and Reviews, -^^ Bishop Mcllvaine : Evidences of Christian-
SCIENTIFIC BASTS OF THEOLOGY. 35
Christ openly submitted tlie truth of his doctrine to the test of
experience, not the same in form or mode as that on testimony ok
which empirical science builds, but an experience Just experience.
as real and that just as really grasps the truth. " My doctrine is
not mine, but his that sent me. If any man will do his will, he
shall know of the doctrine, whether it be of God, or luhether I speak
of myself."^ The same principle is given in these words: ^^He
that believeth on the Son of God hath the witness in himself."^
These texts mean that through experience we may come to know
the doctrine of Christ as the very truth of God, and to know Christ
as the Messiah and Saviour. There is another mode of experience
through which we reach the truth of Christianity. " The Spirit
itself beareth witness with our spirit, that we are the children of
God." " And because ye are sons, God hath sent forth the Spirit
of his Son into your hearts, crying, Abba, Father."^ Here is the
consciousness of a gracious sonship, a consciousness wrought by the
Holy Spirit. This is its distinction of mode, but it is none the less
a fact of consciousness, and, therefore, a veritable fact of experience.
In this experience we grasp the central facts of Christianity, and the
truth of Christianity itself.
The certitude requisite to a science of theology is thus reached.
The result is not affected by any peculiarity of the ex-
J J r J CERTITUDE IN
perience, as compared with that which underlies the this experi-
physical sciences. The method is the same in both, ^^^^'
and as valid in the former as in the latter. Some truths we grasp
by intuition. " There are other truths that come to verification in
consciousness by a process, or by practical exjjeriment ; such are
more commonly called truths of experience — that is, we prove them
by applying experimental tests and by realizing promised results.
Such are truths of the following and similar kind. Christ promises
to realize in us certain experiences if we will comply with certain
conditions. It is the common law of experimental science. When
ity ; Faith and Free Thought, Lectures ; Bishop Foster : The S^ipernatural
Book.
Argument from the character of Christ — Ullman : The Sinlessness of Jesus ;
Barnes : The Evidences of Christianity, lect. viii ; Bayne : The Testimony of
Christ to Christianity ; Young : The Christ of History ; Hopkins : Evidences of
Christianity, lect. viii ; Mozley : Lectures and Other Theological Pajxrs, pp.
116-135 ; Fisher : Supernatural Origin of Christianity, essay xii ; Schaff : The
Person of Christ ; Bushnell : Nature and the Supernatural, chap, x ; Hard-
wicke : Christ and Other Masters ; Lacordaire : Jesus Christ ; Luthardt : Fun-
damental Truths of Christianity, lect. x ; Rowe : Lect. ii, Bampton Lect-
ures, 1877.
"John vii, 16, 17. ' 1 John v, 10. =Rom. viii, 16 ; Gal. iv, 6.
36 INTRODUCTION.
we find at the end of an experiment a result, we demonstrate in ex-
perience a truth. Henceforth we know it to be a truth, because we
have made it matter of experience, not because of any external tes-
timony to it. Such is precisely the test which Christ proposes ;
if we do certain things we shall come to certain knowledges ; if
we come to him Ave shall find rest ; if we do his will we shall
know of the doctrine ; if we believe we shall be saved ; old things
will pass away, and all things will become new; we will become new
creatures ; a new life will come to us, and will evidence itself in our
consciousness, and in the total change of our whole character, ex-
ternal and internal ; for sorrow we shall have Joy ; for a sense of
guilt we will receive a sense of pardon ; for a love of sin we will
have given to us a hungering and thirsting after righteousness ;
from feeling that we are aliens and strangers we shall come to know
that we are the children of God — the Abba, Father, will be put ujion
our tongues and in our hearts."'
The Christian centuries furnish innumerable instances of such
^xpsrience. They are found among the most diverse
INSTANCES OF
THIS EXPERt- races, and among the most gifted and cultured, as among
^^^^" the uncultured and lowly. They are competent wit-
nesses to the reality of this experience. They know the facts of the
expericTice as revealed in their own consciousness, and their testi-
mony has often been given at a cost which allows no question of
their integrity. The certainty of Christian truth is thus reached
through experience. Further, there is here a unity of experience
which verifies the truth and divinity of Christianity. This experi-
ence is one through all the Christian centuries and in all the diver-
sities of condition. There must, therefore, -be reality and divinity
in the Christianity out of which it springs. The physical sciences
would be impossible without a uniformity of experience. There must
be a unit}^ of experience. The objective facts must be the same for
all. There could be no such unity without the reality of the object-
ive facts of experience. This principle is just as valid in Christian-
ity as in the physical sciences. If these sciences deal with realities,
so does Christian theology deal with realities. The truth of Chris-
tianity is thus realized in Christian experience, and in the most
thorough manner. " The nerve of the matter does not lie here —
that both exist side by side, the outward and objective testimony
and the personal and subjective spirit ; it lies here — that both the
genuinely objective and the subjective are brought into one, and
thus into a bond of unity, by virtue of Avhich our certainty knows
itself to be grounded in objective Christian truth that makes itself
' Bishop Foster : The Supernatural Book, p. 318.
SCIENTIFIC BASIS OF THEOLOGY. 37
evident and authoritative to the spirit."' We thus have the certi-
tude requisite to a science of theology.
4. Consistency of Faith with Scientific Certitude. — Theology is
denied a scientific position on the assumption that it deals with
matters of faith, not with matters of fact. This assumption goes
beyond the truth. We have just seen that the vital facts of the-
ology are grasped in experience as really as the facts of empirical
science. Yet we admit an important office of faith in theology.
It is in the mode of faith that we apprehend various truths of the-
ology. If a scientific position is therefore denied to theology it
must be on the assumption that such faith rests on mere authority,
and is wholly without rational ground. Again, the assumption is
false to the facts. The evidences which verify the Scriptures as a
divine revelation constitute a rational ground of faith. That gra-
tuitous assumption wholly ignores the Christian apologetics which
sets forth this ground.
Faith is not a blind acceptance of any alleged fact or principle,
but its acceptance on rational ground. Such ground
^ . . °. °_ RATIONAL
lies in the sufficient evidence of its truth. All faith ground of
that is properly such has respect to evidence as its ra- ^^""•
tional warrant. It follows that faith in its proper sense is a thor-
oughly rational state or act of the mind. There is no exception.
Faith sometimes takes the form of trust. In a profound sense of
aeed the soul trusts in God for his gracious help. The rational
ground of this trust lies in the evidences of his goodness. The
case is not other even when in seasons of deepest trial there is no
outer light upon the ways of God. The evidences of his wisdom and
love still furnish a thoroughly rational ground of trust. It was so
with Abraham in the offering ujd of his son;" with Job when seem-
ingly God was against him; ^ with Paul, who in the deepest trials
still knew whom he believed, and in whom therefore he still
rested with an unwavering trust.'' There are mysteries of doctrine
in theology. We may instance the Trinity and the person of Christ.
We have no power to comprehend these doctrines; and yet we ac-
cept them in faith. It will readily be asked. How can such a faith
be rational? Science is as really concerned in this question as
theology. There are many mysteries of nature within the as-
sumed attainments of science. ^ That every atom of matter attracts
every other atom of the universe, even to the remotest world, is as
profound a mystery for rational thought as either the Trinity or
' Domer : Christian Doctrine, vol. i, p. 154.
"^ Heb. xi, 17-19. ^ Jq^ xiii, 15. ^ 3 Tim. i, 12.
'Bowne : Philosophy of Theism, pp. 17, 18.
38 INTRODUCTION.
the person of Christ. But the question utterly mistakes the nature
and grounds of faith. In no case is the rational comprehen-
sion of any alleged fact or principle the ground of faith in its
truth. Such ground lies wholly in the evidence of its truth.
"When the evidence is adequate the faith is rational. Nor is the
mystery of a doctrine in any sense opposed to the rationality of
faith in its truth when the evidence is adequate. Such is our faith
in the doctrines of the Trinity and the person of Christ. These
doctrines are in the Scriptures; and the Scriptures bear the seal of
a divine original. They are a revelation of truth from God. The
proof is conclusive. God^s revelation of truth is truth itself, and
the most certain truth. The princijile is valid for all the doctrinal
contents of the Scriptures. Thus when we reach the true grounds
of faith we still find the certitude requisite to a science of theology.
The empirical sciences cannot exclude the principle of faith.
Such exclusion would reduce them to the narrowest
possWle limits, if not render them wholly imjiossible. We
WITHOUT previously pointed out that all empirical knowledge of
FAITH. t J L 1 t)
facts is purely personal. No one can share the experi-
ences of another. Hence the scientist, in whatever sphere of nat-
ure, must either limit himself to facts of his own observation or
appropriate the observations of others. In the former case the at-
tainable facts are insufficient for the construction of any science.
This exigency constrains the use of reported observations. This
use is very common in the treatment of the sciences. It appears
in astronomy, in geology, in archaeology, in chemistry, in botany,
in physiology, in natural history, in any and all of the sciences.
The only ground of certainty in the facts so used is the testimony
of such as report them. But testimony furnishes no empirical
knowledge; it furnishes the ground of faith, and of faith only.
Thus it is that the empirical sciences largely build on faith, and
must so build. Theology has the same right, and is equally sure
of its facts. We have philosophies of history, which, if properly
such, must contain all that a science of history could mean. No
man can be personally cognizant of facts sufficient in number for
such a philosophy or science. Faith in facts as given on testimony
must underlie all such work.' If this mode is valid for science it
must be valid for theology.
There is another fact which concerns this question. It is not
only true that one's experience is purely personal to himself, but
equally true that his experience is purely of individual things. In
all the realm of nature no one has, or can have, empirical knowl-
' Tatham : Chart and Scale of Truth, vol. i, pp. 204-208.
SCIENTIFIC BASIS OF THEOLOGY. 39
edge of any thing beyond the few facts of his own observation or
testing. Families, species, genera, as known in science
• • • ^EXPERIENCE
or logic, are no empirical cognitions, but creations of only of in-
thought which must transcend experience. Yet they ^/J^jg^ ^^^
are necessary ideas of science. By a proper testing one
finds the qualities of a specimen of metal or mineral, or of a par-
ticular plant or animal, and proceeds to a scientific classification of
all like instances as possessing the same qualities. However, the
principle on which he jiroceeds is just the reverse of the Aristote-
lian, that what is true of the class is true of each individual; it is
that what is true of one or a few is true of all like instances. But
how does he know that the many untested cases are so like the
tested few as to meet the requirements of a scientific classification?
It will not suffice that in ajipearance they are the same. The ap-
pearance is merely superficial, and may fail to give the interior
facts. The qualities of the few tested cases were not given in the
appearance, but found by a deep and thorough searching. There
is no such testing or empirical knowledge, except in a very few in-
stances of the great multitude assumed to be covered by the science.
Thus it is that in every sphere of nature science is made to cover
a vast aggregate of individuals which were never prop-
erly tested. How can empirical science justify itself in broader
such cases ? Only on the assumption of some princi- "^^^^ expkri-
ple that guarantees the uniformity of nature, or that
determines the intrinsic identity of things superficially alike. Such
science could not else proceed beyond the few facts empirically
known, and therefore would be an impossibility. We are not here
concerned to dispute the legitimacy of this method of science; but
we may with propriety point out and emphasize its wide departure
from that narrow empiricism on the ground of which the claim of
theology to a scientific position is denied. The ground of this de-
nial is thus entirely surrendered. Science itself has too much to
do with matters of faith to dispute the scientific claim of theology
because it has to do with such matters. There is no inconsistency
of faith with scientific certitude.'
5. The Function of Reason in Theology. — The errors of rational-
ism must not discredit the offices of our rational intelligence in
questions of religion and theology. A system of Christian doc-
trines is no more possible without rational thought than the con-
struction of any science within the realm of nature. There is in
the two cases the same intellectual requirement in dealing with the
material out of which the science is wrought.
' Herbert : Modern Realism , pp. 357-367.
40 INTRODUCTION.
The idea of religion as a faith and practice is the idea of a per-
son rationally endowed and acting in the deepest form
REASON NKCKS- . . -^ . ° ^
SARY TO RE- of lils rational agency. It is true that a religious life
LiGioN. ^g impossible without the activity of the moral and re-
ligious sensibilities — just as there cannot be for us either society,
or friendship, or country, or home, or a world of beauty without
the appropriate feeling. But mere feeling will not answer for any
of these profoundly interesting states. There must be the activity
of thought as the condition and illumination of such feeling. So
it is in religion: God and duty must come into thought before the
heart can respond in the proper religious feeling, or the life be
given to him in true obedience and worship. The religious sensi-
bilities are natively as strong under the lowest forms of idolatry as
under the highest forms of Christian theism, and should yield as
lofty a service, if religion were purely a matter of feeling. The
religious life and worship take their vastly higher forms under
Christian theism through higher mental conceptions of God and
duty. There is thus manifest a profound office of our rational in-
telligence in religion.
There is not a question of either natural or revealed religion that
is not open to rational consideration. Even the truths
ALL QUESTIONS . ^
OF RELIGION of Scrlpturc which transcend our power of comprehen-
TioNAL co.\- sion must in some measure be apprehended in their
siDERATioN. doctrlual contents in order to their acceptance in a
proper faith.
If we should even assume that the existence of God is an intui-
,.„,.,ow ,o tive truth, or an immediate datum of the moral and
THEISM IS A
R A T 1 0 N A L religious consciousness, we must still admit that the
question is open to the treatment of the logical reason.
We have seen that the Scriptures fully recognize in the works of
nature the proofs of the divine existence. These proofs address
themselves to our logical reason, and can serve their purpose only
as apprehended in our rational intelligence. When so ajDprehended
and accepted as rationally conclusive, theism is a rational faith.
Such has ever been the position of the most eminent Christian
theists. They have appealed the question of the divine existence
to the rational proofs furnished in the realm of nature and in the
constitution and consciousness of man. Thus they have found the
sure ground of their own faith and successfully repelled the assaults
of atheism. The many treatises in the maintenance of theism
fully recognize the profound function of our logical reason in this
ground-truth of religion.
The idea of a divine revelation is the idea of a capacity in us for
SCIENTIFIC BASIS OF THEOLOGY. 41
its reception. A divine revelation is, in the nature of it, a divine
communication of truth, and especially of moral and ^^^^^^^ ^^^_
religious truth. There can be no communication of ditionsarev-
such truth where there is no capacity for its apprehen- ^^^'^'°''*-
sion and reception. Without such capacity the terms of such a rev-
elation would be meaningless. There can be no such capacity with-
out our rational intelligence. We admit the value of our moral and
religious sensibilities in our spiritual cognitions ; not, however, as
in themselves cognitive, but as subsidiary to the cognitive power of
our rational faculties. Many of the facts and truths of revelation,
as given in the Scriptures, are cognizable only in our logical reason.
Hence the idea of a divine revelation assumes an important office
of our reason in theology.
Are the Scriptures a revelation of truth from God ? An affirma-
tive answer must rest on rational grounds of evidence.
. ° . . APOLOGETICS
This means that the whole question of evidence is open an appeal to
to rational treatment. The divine origin of the Script- ^*'''^''^^-
ures is a question of fact. Such an origin can be rationally
accepted in faith only on the ground of verifying evidence. All
such evidence addresses itself to the logical reason. In experi-
ence we may reach an immediate knowledge of certain verities
of religion ; but all such experience is purely personal, and if
it is to possess any apologetic value beyond this personal lim-
itation, or in the mind of others, it must be treated as logical
evidence of the truths alleged to be so found. Even the sub-
jects of this experience may severally take it up into the rational
intelligence and treat it as logical proof of the truths assumed to be
immediately reached in experience. Beyond such experience the
whole question of a divine revelation in the Scriptures is a question
of rational proofs. By rational proofs we mean such facts of evi-
dence as satisfy our logical reason. A question of fact is a ques-
tion of fact, in whatever sphere it may arise. In this view the
question of a divine original of the Scriptures is not different from
other questions of fact within the realms of history and science.
The proofs may lie in peculiar or widely different facts, but they
are not other for rational thought or the logical reason. Christ
openly appealed to the proofs of his Messiahship, and demanded
faith on the ground of their evidence. The apostles furnished the
credentials of their divine commission as the teachers of religious
truth. The Scriptures demand no faith except on the ground of
evidence rationally sufficient. The Church has ever recognized
this function of reason respecting the divine origin of the Script-
ures. Every Christian apologist, from the earliest to the latest.
42 INTRODUCTION.
has appealed this question to our rational intelligence, on the
assumption of proofs appropriate and sufficient as the ground of a
rational faith in its trutli. Such is the office of reason respecting
the truth of a divine revelation.
Our position ma}' seem to concede the logical legitimacy of the
"higher criticism,'' with its destructive tendencies.
wK.oMn)i.^TiiK If the Scriptures ground their claim to a divine original
"iiKiiiEKCRiT- jjj rational proofs, have not all seemingly opposing
facts a right to rational consideration as bearing upon
that great question ? Yes ; and if such facts should ever be found
decisively stronger than the proofs the divine origin of the Script-
ures could no longer be held in a rational faith. The rights of
logic must be conceded ; and Christian apologetics has too long ap-
pealed this question to our logical reason now to forbid a considera-
tion of seemingly adverse facts in a manner logically legitimate to
its own principles and method. This is conceded in the manner of
meeting the issues of the "higher criticism." Here are such ques-
tions as the Mosaic authorship of the Pentateuch, the unitary author-
ship of Isaiah, the genuineness and j)rophetic character of the Book of
Daniel — questions which deeply concern the evidences of the divine
original of the Scriptures. How are the destructionists met on these
and similar issues ? Not by denying their logical right to raise such
questions, but by controverting the facts which they allege and dis-
proving the conclusions which they reach. In these matters logic
suffers many wrongs at their hand. Nor can any legitimacy of
the qiiestions raised free much of the "higher criticism " from the
charge of an obtrusive and destructive rationalism.
What are the contents of the Scriptures ? What are the facts
which thev record, with their meaning ? What are
CONTENTS OF - .*' • «■
THE scKiHT- tlicir cthical and doctrinal teachings .'' All these
al^nouiry"'^ questions are open to the investigation of the logical
reason — just as the contents of other books. It is not
meant that the spiritual mood of the student is indifferent to these
questions. It may be such as to blind the mental eye, or such as
to give it clearness of vision. Such is the case on many questions
of the present life. AVhat in one's view is proper and right in
another's is wrong and base. AVhat to one is lofty patriotism is
to another the outrage of rebellion or lawless and vindictive war.
What one views as saintly heroism another views as cunning
hypocrisy or a wild fanaticism. So much have our subjective
states to do with our judgments. But we are responsible for these
states, and therefore for the judgments which they so much in-
fluence. A proper adjustment of our mental state to any subject
SCIENTIFIC BASIS OF THEOLOGY. 43
in which the sensibilities are concerned is necessary to the clearer
and truer view of it. Such state, however, is not the organ of
knowledge, but a preparation for the truer judgment. Sobriety is
proper for all questions. Devoutness is the only proper mood for
the study of the questions of religion, and therefore for the study of
the contents of the Scriptures. Such a mental mood is our duty in
the study of the Scriptures, not that it is in itself cognizant of their
contents, nor that it determines the judgment, but simply that it
clears the vision of our reason and so prepares it for the discovery of
the truth. With such a mental mood it is the function of our rea-
son to ascertain the religious and doctrinal contents of the ScrijDtures.
A high function of the logical reason in systematic theology can
hardly be questioned. A system of theology is a sci-
• OFFICF Of RFA-
entific construction of doctrines. The method is de- son in sys-
termined by the laws of logic. These laws rule all tematic the-
•^ . ^ . . OLOGY.
scientific work. Any violation of their order is a de-
parture from the scientific method. They are the same for theol-
ogy as for the sciences in the realm of nature. The method of
every science is a rational method. Science is a construction in
rational thought. A system of theology is such a science. The
construction of such a system is the function of reason in theology.
A glance at the errors of rationalism will clearly show that there
is not an item of such error in the doctrine of reason ^^^ function
above maintained. "We speak of errors of rationalism of reason in
Avith respect to its distinctions of form rather than in from ration-
view of fundamental distinctions. While varying in ^^^^^'•
the matters specially emphasized, it is one in determining prin-
ciple. Human reason is above all necessity and authority of a
divine revelation : this is rationalism.
The English deism of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries
was thoroughly rationalistic in its around. It denied
. ^ •' ^ rationalism
all necessity for a supernatural revelation and exalted of the en-
reason to a position of entire sufficiency for all the g"sh deism.
moral and religious needs of man. Whatever he needs to know re-
specting God and duty and a future destiny may be discovered in
the light of nature. The law of nature is the cardinal idea. In
consequence of this fact this form of rationalism was often called
naturalism ; and, further, it was so called in distinction from the
supernaturalism which underlies the Scriptures as a divine revela-
tion. The rationalistic principles, as above stated, are the princi-
ples of the notable book of Lord Herbert which initiated this great
deistic movement.' There is no concession that only obscure views
' De Veritate, prout Distinguitur a Revelatione.
44 INTRODUCTION.
of morality and religion arc attainable by the light of reason. The
position is rather that on these great questions reason is quite equal,
or even superior, to the Scriptures. Many followed Herbert in the
maintenance of like views : Blount,' Toland,'' Collins,* Tyndall/ and
others whose names are here omittod. The titles of their works
clearly evince their rationalistic ground. Some of them mean an
assumption to account for the Scriptures and for Christianity on
purely natural grounds. The law of nature and tlie sufficiency of
the law of nature are the ruling ideas. There is a law of nature in
the sense of a light of nature on the questions of morality and relig-
ion. Nor was this idea at all original with these deists. It is in
the Scriptures, in the earlier Christian literature, and so continued
through the Christian centuries. About the time cf Herbert, and
vrithout reference to the dcistic movement Avhich he initiated, emi-
nent Christian writers maintained this law. We may instance Gro-
tius^ and Hooker.* These eminent authors, however, v/ere pro-
foundly loyal to the Scriptures as a revelation of truth from God,
and the only sufficient source of truth on the great quections of
morality and religion. Thus the rationalistic errors of this deism
were wholly avoided. It is in this manner that the functions cf
reason in questions of religion, which we previously set forth, are
entirely free from these errors.
Christian apologists were promptly on hand for the defense of the
Scrij)tures as an actual and necessary revelation of truth from God,
and so continued on hand through this long contention. It was a
hundred-years' war. These champions of Christianity are far too
numerous for individual mention. We may instance a few with
their works : Cumberland,^ Parker,® Wilkins,* Locke," Lardner,"
More," Cudworth,'^ Ilowe,'^ Butler.'^ Varying phases of the j)er-
sistcnt deism called for variations in the defensive and aggressive
work of the Christian apologists. These variations in some meas-
ure appear in the titles of their works. While some maintained a
high doctrine of reason in questions of religion, others, esj)eeially
' Oracles of Reason. ^ Christianity Not a Mystery.
^ Grounds and Reasons of the Christian Religion.
* Christianity as Old as the Creation.
* Rights of Peace and War. * Ecclesiastical Polity, book i.
' De Legibus Naturae Disquisitio Philosophica.
* Demonstration of the Law of Nature and of the Christian Religion.
' The Principles and Duties of Natural Religion.
" Reasonableness of Christianity.
" Vindication of the Miracles of Our Lord.
" Dialogues ; Mystery of Godliness. '^ Intellectual System.
'■• Living Temple, part i. " Analogy.
SCIENTIFIC BASIS OF THEOLOGY. 45
some of the later apologists, assumed a ground far too low ; but all
agreed, and those of the higher doctrine as really as those of the
lower, in the necessity and value of the Scriptures as a revelation
of truth from God. All were thus wholly free from the errors of
rationalism.'
The German rationalism is less definite and uniform than that
of the English deism, but not less real. The same su- (.krman ra-
premacy of reason is maintained. An inspiration of tioxnalism.
the Scriptures is often admitted, and also that it gives to the Script-
ures value for religion. But it is not such an inspiration as an-
swers to the truth of the doctrine; nor such as can give authority
to the Scriptures in matters of faith and practice. As some minds
are specially gifted in the sphere of philosophy, or statesmanship,
or mechanics, or art, so some minds are specially gifted in the
sphere of religion. But this is from an original endowment, not
from any immediate divine inspiration. There is no true inspira-
tion, and therefore no divine authority of the Scriptures. Their
contents are subject to the determining test of human reason.
Whatever will not answer to this test must be rejected. What re-
mains cannot be conceded any divine authority, but must take its
place in the plane of human reason. Any value it may possess for
religion must arise, not from a divine original, but from the ap-
proval of our reason. The profoundest truths of Christianity must
be open to philosophic treatment and determination. Eeason must
comprehend the divine Trinity and the personality of the Christ,
if these doctrines are to be accepted as truths of religion. The con-
sequence must be either their outright rejection or their utter per-
version through a false interpretation. This unqualified subjec-
tion of the Scriptures, with all their doctrinal contents, to the de-
termination of human reason is the essence of the German ration-
alism on the questions of religion. These statements are fully
justified by the best definitions of rationalism, such as may be
found in the works of Wegscheider, Stiiudlin, Halm, Rose, Bret-
schneider, McCaul, Saintes, and Lecky. These definitions are
given at length in the excellent work of Bishop Hurst. ^ The sub-
stance is in this brief definition: *' Rationalism, in religion, as op-
posed to supernaturalism, means the adoption of reason as our
sufficient and only guide, exclusive of tradition and revelation. " ^
Such rationalism leads on to the perversion or elimination of all
the vital truths of Christian theology, not because they are in any
proper sense opposed to human reason, but because they have their
' Gillett : The Moral System, Introduction.
' History of Rationalism, Introduction. ' Krauth-Fleming : Vocabulary,
46 INTRODFCTION.
only source and sufficient grountl in the Scriptures. If truths at
PERVERSION ^^^* ^^®y ^^^ divinely revealed truths. The ground of
OK CHRISTIAN thcir trutli lies in the evidences which verify the
DocTRiNK. Scriptures as a divine revelation. To accept them
simply on such ground is contrary to the ruling principles of ra-
tionalism. Their rejection is the legitimate consequence. That
such consequence followed the prevalence of rationalism in Ger-
many is simply the truth of history.' The inspiration of the
Scriptures, the Adamic fall and corruption of the race, the redemp-
tion and salvation in the vicarious sacrifice of Christ, justification
by faith, spiritual regeneration, a new life in th« Holy Spirit — these
vital truths could not remain under the dominance of rationalism.
Their rejection is simply the consequence of their inconsistency
with the determining principles of rationalism, and not that they
are in any true sense opposed to our rational intelligence. There
is nothing unreasonable in the doctrine of a divine revelation of
truths of religion above our own power of discovery; nothing un-
reasonable in the vital truths so given in the Scriptures. Even the
truths which surpass our power of comprehension do not contra-
dict our reason. That any revealed truth should contradict our
reason would itself contradict all the ruling ideas of a divine revela-
tion. There are rights of reason in questions of religion which
such a revelation may not violate, and Avhich, indeed, would there-
by render itself impossible. " We must have rational grounds for
the acceptance of a supernatural revelation. It must verify its
right to teach authoritatively. Reason must be competent to judge,
if not of the content, at least of the credentials, of revelation. But
an authority proving by reason its right to teach irrationally ic an
impossible conception."^ But truths of Scripture which, as the
divine Trinity and the personality of the Christ, transcend our
power of comprehension arc not on that account in any con-
tradiction to our reason, nor in any proper sense irrational. The
infinity of space is not an irrational idea. Indeed, it is a necessary
truth of our reason; and yet it is quite as incomprehensible as
either the divine Trinity or the personality of the Christ. But
t:ie determining principles of rationalism, which hold the subjec-
tion of all questions of religion to a philosophic rationale, must re-
ject these great and vital truths of Christianity.
The high function of reason in questions of religion and theology,
as previously maintained, is entirely free from all these errors of
rationalism. It is thoroughly loyal to the Scriptures as a super-
' Hurst : Histoiij of Rationalism, chap. viii.
^ Caird : Philosophy of Religion, pp. 69, 70.
SCIENTIFIC BASIS OF THEOLOGY. 47
natural revelation of truth from God, and submissive to their au-
thority in questions of faith and practice. It heartily
•^ ^ . . . . "^ TRUE LOYALTY
accepts the vital truths of Christianity on the ground TOTHEscRipxr
of their divine original. This is no blind submission of ^^*'^"
our reason to mere authority. The word of God contains within
itself the highest reason of its truth. Nothing is accepted with
higher reason of its truth than that which God has spoken. The
Scriptures ground their claim upon our acceptance in the sufficient
proofs that they are the word of God. In this they duly respect
our rational intelligence. Evangelical theology ever renews this
tribute. It is useless to object that the authority conceded to the
Scriptures in questions of religion would require the belief of things
most irrational, or even contradictory to our reason, if divinely re-
vealed. The objection is ruled out as utterly irrelevant and ground-
less. Such a divine revelation is unthinkable.'
IV. Systemization A Eight of Theology.
Whatever is open to scientific treatment may rightfully, and with
the warrant of reason, be so treated. There is no exception. On
this common gi'ound geology, physiology, and entomology right-
fully take their place with astronomy, psychology, and anthro-
pology in the list of the sciences. The denial of such right to
theology would bar the entrance of science into the sphere which
infinitely transcends every other in the richness of its material and
the value of its truths.
1. Theology Ojjen to Scientific Treatment. — In treating the sci-
entific basis of theology we found in the facts all the certitude
requisite to the construction of a science. The point here is that,
beyond the requisite certitude, these facts are open to scientific con-
struction. Out of the facts respecting God, as manifest in nature
and revealed in Scripture, we may construct a doctrine of God.
So out of the facts of Scripture we may construct a doctrine of the
Trinity, and a doctrine of the person of Christ. Thus we may pro-
ceed, as theologians have often exemplified, with all the great
truths of Christian theology respecting sin, atonement, justifica-
tion, regeneration, and the rest. Then doctrine agrees with doc-
trine. The doctrines of sin, justification, and regeneration are in
full scientific accord. The Christology of the Scriptures is neces-
' Eose : The State of Protestantism in Germany; McCaul : Thoughts on Ration-
alism; Saintes : Histoire du Rationalisme; Lecky : History of the Rise and In-
fluence of the Spirit of Rationalism in Europe; Mansel : Limits of Religious
Thought; Hurst ; Ilistoi^j of Rationalism; Fisher : Faith and Rationalism}
Hagenbacli : German Rationalism in its Rise, Progress, and Decline.
48 INTRODUCTION.
sary to their sotcriolog}-. The doctrine of Boteriology through the
atonement in Christ and the agency of the Holy Spirit requires the
doctrine of the Trinity. Doctrines so related clearly admit of
systemization.
2. Objections to the Systemization. — In view of the many diver-
gences from a thorouglily evangelical theology, objections to sys-
tematic theology, and indeed to all doctrinal theology, should cause
no surprise. Evangelical Christianity centers in the vital doctrines
of Christian theology. Hence any departure from evangelical
Christianity means opposition to its vital doctrines. Even some in
evangelical association largely discount, or even decry, all doctrinal
theology. This cannot be other than detrimental to the vital inter-
ests of Christianity.
One objection may be put in this form : Eeligion is a life, not a
doctrine. Tliis objection emphasizes the subjective
EssARYTo RE- form of religion. True religion is a right state of feel-
LiGioN. .^g ^^^^ ^ practice springing out of such feeling. Ee-
ligion is of the heart, not of tlio head. If the heart is right the
religion is right, whatever be the doctrine. The meaning of the
objection is that the cardinal doctrines of the Gospel may hinder a
right state of religious feeling, but cannot be helpful to such a
state. This view must be in favor with all forms of theological ra-
tionalism, and the more as the departure is the farther from a true
evangelical ground.
The trutli in this case is that religion is both a life and a doc-
trine. Eeligion has its subjective form in an active state of the
moral and religious sensibilities. We cannot else be religious. But
doctrines have a necessary part in their conditioning relation to
such a state of feeling. The truth of this statement is the truth of
a vital connection of doctrines with the religious life. The contrary
view is philosophically shallow and false to the facts of Christian
history. A religious movement, with power to lift up souls into a
true spiritual life, must have its inception and progress in a clear
and earnest presentation of the vital doctrines of religion. The
order of facts in every such movement in the history of Christian-
ity has been, first a reformation of doctrine, and then through the
truer doctrine a higher and better moral and spiritual life. Let
the Lutheran reformation and the Wesleyan movement be in-
stanced in illustration. Such has ever been, and must forever be,
the chronological order of these facts, because it is the logical order.
"When souls move up from a sinful life or a dead formalism
into a true spiritual life they must have the necessary rea-
sons and motives for such action. The religious feelings must
SYSTEMIZATION A RIGHT OF THEOLOGY. 49
be quickened into practical activity. This is the necessity for
doctrinal truth. Religious feelings without definite practical
truths to which they respond can have little beneficial result in the
moral and spiritual life, because the necessary reasons and motives
for such a life are not present to the mind. When such reasons
and motives are presented they must be embodied in the vital doc-
trines of the Gospel. AVhy should we repent of sin? Why be-
lieve in Christ for salvation? Why be born of the Spirit? Why be
consecrated to God in a life of holy obedience and love? The true
answers to these profound questions of the religious life must give
the essential doctrines of Christian theology. If we should repent
of sin, God must be our moral Ruler, and we his subjects, with re-
sponsible moral freedom. If we should believe in Christ for salva-
tion, he must be the divine Son of God, incarnate in our nature,
and his blood an atonement for our sins. If we must be born of
the Spirit, we are a fallen race, with native depravity, and the
Spirit a divine personal agent in the work of our salvation. If we
should be consecrated to God in a life of holy obedience and love,
it must be for reasons of duty and motives of spiritual well-being
which are complete only in the distinctive doctrines of Christian-
ity. These doctrines are not mere intellectual principles or dry
abstractions, but living truths which embody all the practical
forces of Christianity. The spiritual life takes a higher form under
evangelical Christianity than is possible under any other form,
whether ritualistic or rationalistic, because therein the great doc-
trines of the Gospel are apprehended in a living faith and act
with their transcendent practical force upon all that enters into
this life. It is surely true that any theory which discounts the
value of doctrines in the Christian life is philosophically shallow.'
It is objected to the systemization of theology that it is valueless.
In the logical order of the facts the formation of the
, . T T . SYSTEMIZA-
doctrines severally must precede their construction in tion not tal-
a system. Hence it is objected that the systemization ^*^^^^^-
can add nothing of value to these doctrines. It might here suffice
to answer that if nothing is thus added neither is any thing ab-
stracted; so that these doctrines suffer no detriment by their
systemization. Hence the objection can have no special perti-
nence as against the systemization of theology, and really means
opposition to all doctrinal theology. If, however, we have the
doctrines, and must have the doctrines if we would have the
life of Christianity, there can be no valid objection against
their systemization. That systemization adds nothing of valiie
' Caird : Philosophy of Religion, pp. 165-175.
60 INTRODUCTION.
is just the contrary of the truth. This question, however, has a
more appropriate place.
One more objection we may notice. Doctrinal theology, and
especially systematic theology, engenders bigotry. Nei-
souRCE OF ther by necessity nor even by any natural tendency is a
BIGOTRY. system of theology which embodies the cardinal truths
of Christianity the source of bigotry. AVhen these doctrines are
embraced in a living faith there must be a profound sense of their
importance, and they may be, and should be, held with tenacity
and maintained Avith earnestness. This is but a proper and dutiful
contention for the faith once delivered to the saints.' Such con-
tention, however, is not bigotry. It is no blind zeal for things in-
different or of little moment, but a living attachment to the vital
truths of Christianity for the weightiest reasons. In the forms of
rationalism from which our Lord is almost entirely dismissed little
Christian truth remains which any one should hold tenaciously or
for which he should contend earnestly ; but there is a bigotry of
negation, and the self-styled liberalist is often most illiberal. As it
resjaects bigotry or the spirit of a true magnanimity, evangelical
theology has no concession to make to a vaunting liberalism.
3. Reasons for the Systemization. — There are many reasons. A
few may be briefly stated.
A scientific treatment or systemization of theology is a mental
A MENTAL RE- requircmcnt. As by a mental tendency we are im-
QuiREMENT. pcllcd to 0, study of the qualities of things, so by a
tendency equally strong we are led to a study of their relations.
This is inevitable in all profounder study. These relations are as
real and interesting for thought as the things in their several in-
dividualities." The most thorough study of the facts of geology,
natural history, astronomy, psychology, or ethics can neither sat-
isfy nor limit the researches of thought. A law of the mind com-
pels a comparison and classification of these facts in the order of
their relations, and a generalization in the laws which unite and
interpret them. There is the same mental requirement in the study
of theology.
The results justify the systemization. The beneficial results in
BENEFICIAL scieucc and philosophy are manifest. It is only
RESULTS. through the inception of scientific thought, in however
crude a form, that things begin to pass out of their isolated in-
dividualities into classes. In the extent of this result the knowl-
edge of one is the knowledge of many. As classifications are broad-
ened and grounded in deeper principles knowledge advances. The
' Jude 3.
SYSTEMIZATION A RIGHT OF THEOLOGY. 51
more comprehensive the generalizations the fuller is the knowledge.
This is the only method of advancement from the merest rudiments
of knowledge up to the highest attainments of science and philosophy.
Theology must not be denied this method through which other spheres
of study have profited so much. It has the same right as others. It
is only through a scientific treatment of doctrines that the highest
attainments in theology are possible. The scientific method is thus
of value in theology, just as in other spheres of knowledge. The
great doctrines of religion are most intimately related and must be
in scientific accord. Their scientific agreement can be found only
as they are brought into systematic relations. Each doctrine is the
clearer as it is seen in the light of its harmony with other doctrines.
"With such relations of these doctrines, it is only through their sys-
temization that we can reach the highest knowledge of theological
truth.
V. Method of Systemization.
There is nothing in theology determinative of a oneness of method
in the systemization of its doctrines. Hence variations of method
naturally arise from different casts of mind. Some regard one
truth as the more central and determining, while in the view of
others, not less scientific or exact, some other truth should hold
the ruling place. Such truth, whatever it may be, determines the
method of systemization.
1. Various Methods 171 Use. — We have no occasion for even the
naming of all these methods, much less for their review
Seven are given in the following very compact state
ment : " («) The analytic method of Calixtus begins with the as-
sumed end of all things, blessedness, and then passes to the means
by which it is secured, {h) The trinitarian method of Leydecker
and Martensen regards Christian doctrine as a manifestation suc-
cessively of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, (c) The federal
method of Cocceius, Witsius, and Boston treats theology under
the two covenants, {d) The anthropological method of Chalmers
and Rothe. The former begins with the disease of man and j)asses
to the remedy ; the latter divides his dogmatic into the conscious-
ness of sin and the consciousness of redemption, (e) The Chris-
tological method of Hase, Thomasius, and Andrew Fuller treats of
God, man, and sin as presuppositions of the person and work of
Christ. Mention may also be made of (/) The historical method,
.followed by Ursinus, and adopted in Jonathan Edwards's History
of Redemption ; and (^) The allegorical method of Dannhauer, in
which man is described as a wanderer, life as a road, the Holy
Spirit as a light, the Church as a candlestick, God as the end, and
STATEMENT OF
METHODS.
52 INTRODUCTION.
heaven as the home."' Only representative names are given with
these several methods. Other names might be added and other
methods given. Some would vary the above analysis and classifica-
tion. AVhile Edwards treats redem2)tion in the order of its bibli-
cal history, liis theological method is clearly Christological. That
of Dannhauer is just as clearly anthropological.
The aim of such methods is a unity of systematic theology which
UNITY OK DOC- ^^ I's^lly Unattainable. There is no one principle, as
TRi.NKs THE mostly these methods assume, in which all the doctrines
unite — no one doctrine out of which all the others may
be developed. This may readily be shown. In one theory blessed-
ness is the assumed end of all things. How can we roach this view ?
Only through the idea of God. Hence this idea is first in order,
and the deeper truth. Further, neither the doctrine of sin nor the
doctrine of redemption can be deduced from the notion of blessedness
as the end of existence. The anthropological method is quite as
fruitless. There is no attainment of a Christian doctrine of sin
without a Christian doctrine of God. Hence the latter cannot be
deduced from the former. Nor can the Christian doctrine of atone-
ment be deduced simply from the fact of sin. No deej)er unity is
THE cHRisTo- ^'^'^clicd througli the Christological method. To the
CENTRIC names above given Avith this method we may add that
of Henry B. Smith as one of the latest to adopt it.
With this Christological center his leading divisions are : 1. The
antecedents of redemption ; 2. The liedeemer and his work ; 3. The
consequents of redemption." Antecedents and consequents are
very different terms, and mean very different relations to Christ:
the former, a relation simply in the order of time, the latter a
relation in the order of effects, or at least in the order of logic.
With this wide difference between the two classes of truths in
their relation to Christ, the unity of systematic theology thus
attempted is surely not attained. In the subdivisions the fruit-
lessness of the method, as it respects this unity, is manifest.
There is nothing peculiar to this method, but all proceeds in the
usual natural or logical order of the doctrinal topics. There is a
profound sense in which the doctrine of Christ is the central
truth of Christian theology ; but it is still true that other doctrines,
such as the doctrine of God and the doctrine of the Trinity, must
precede this doctrine, because we cannot else reach a true doctrine
of the person and work of Christ. Hence the system of doctrines
cannot be develoi)e(l from a purely Christological source. This is
' Strong : Systematic Theology, p. 27.
* Introduction to Chinstian Theology, p. 225.
METHOD OF SYSTEMIZATIOK 53
really admitted by Nitzsch, tliough liis own method is substantially
the Christological : "It cannot, therefore, be doubted that the
idea of a Kedeemer, or the dogma of Christ, is the primary, funda-
mental, and inclusive dogma of Christian doctrine, as such ; only
the series of Christian dogmas cannot be developed in one and the
same direction from the doctrine of the Eedeemer ; for the mere
progressive development of the dogma of Christ looks back, in all
its elements, upon other truths which, indeed, though not independ-
ent of Christ, of his being and state, still, at the same time, are
acknowledged as suppositions of his personal being and work by
means of a regressive development."' Vie have thus glanced at
some of these methods to show their insufficiency for the deeper
unity of systematic theology at which they aim. What is thus true
of some is true of all.
2. True Method in the Logical Order. — The method of treat-
ment should conform to the nature of the subject. The deductive
method is applicable to mathematics, but not to chemistry or psy-
chology. Nor is it applicable to Christian theology, and for the rea-
son already pointed out — that there is no one principle or doctrine
from which the others may be deduced. In theology the work of
systemization is constructive, and must proceed in a synthetic mode.
In a true systemization each doctrine must be scientifically con-
structed, and the several doctrines must be brought into complete sci-
entific accordance. No higher unity of systematic theology is attain-
able. The synthetic method will fully answer for this attainment.
By the logical order of doctrines we here mean the order in
which they arise for thought, and for the most intel- sejjse ^^ log-
ligible treatment. In this view the logical order is "^al order.
little different from the natural order. Each truth, except the
first, must take its place in such relation to preceding truths as
shall set it in the clearest light. God is the ground-truth in re-
ligion, and therefore the first in order. Every other truth, if it would
be the more clearly seen, must be viewed in the light of this first
truth. For a like reason anthropology must precede Christology,
and Christology must precede soteriology. This is what we here
mean by the logical order.
3. Subjects as Given i7i the Logical Order. — Only a very sum-
mary statement is here required.
Theism : The existence of a personal God, Creator, Preserver,
and Euler of all things.
Theology : The attributes of God ; the Trinity ; creation and
providence — in the fuller light of revelation.
' System of Christian Doctrine, p. 124.
64 INTRODUCTION.
Anthropology : The origin of man ; his primitive state and
apostasy ; the consequent state of the race.
Christology : Tlie incarnation of the Son ; the joerson of the
Christ.
Soteriology : The atonement in Christ ; the salvation in Christ.
Ecclesiology : The Church ; the ministry ; the sacraments ; means
of grace.
Eschatology : The intermediate state ; the second advent ; the
resurrection ; the judgment ; the final destinies.
Apologetics is not of the nature of a Christian doctrine, and may
properly be omitted from the system, as it often is. Any sufficient
reason for its inclusion might properly require a treatment of all
questions of canonicity, textual integrity, higher criticism, genuine-
ness, and authenticity Avhich in anywise concern the truth of a
divine original of the Scriptures. Apologetics would thus become
a disproportionate magnitude in a system of doctrines.
Neither is ethics, especially theoretical or philosophical ethics,
of the nature of a Christian doctrine. It is true that the grounds
and motives of Christian duty lie in Christian doctrine. The re-
quirements of such duty should not be omitted, nor can they, in
any proper treatment of soteriology. But it is not a requirement
of systematic theology that ethics should form a distinct part.'
* On the method of systematic theology — Nitzsch : Si/stem of Christian Doc-
trine, Introduction, iv ; Crooks and Hurst : Theological Encyclopcedia and Meth-
odology, pp. 420-424 ; Shedd : Dogmatic Theology, vol. i, chap, i ; Dorner :
System of Christian Doctrine, vol. i, pp. 168-184 ; Van Oosterzee : Christian
Dogmatics, Introduction ; Riibiger : Theological Encyclopcedia, vol. ii, Thii'd
Division.
PART I.
THEISM.
XH KI » M.
CHAPTEK L
PBELIMIWARY QUESTIONS.
I. The Sense of Theism.
1. Doctrinal Content of the Term. — Theism means the existence
of a personal God, Creator, Preserver, and Euler of all things.
Deism equally means the personality of Grod and also his creative
work, but denies his providence in the sense of theism. These
terms were formerly used in much the same sense, but since early
in the last century deism has mostly been used in a sense opposed
to the Scriptures as a divine revelation, and to a divine prov-
idence. Such is now its distinction from theism. Pantheism
differs from theism in the denial of the divine personality. With
this denial, pantheism can mean no proper work of creation or prov-
idence. The philosophic agnosticism which posits the Infinite as
the ground of finite existences, but denies its personality, is in this
denial quite at one with pantheism. The distinction of theism from
these several opposing terms sets its own meaning in the clearer
light. Creation and providence are here presented simply in their
relation to the doctrinal content of theism. The methods of the di-
vine agency therein require separate treatment. JSTor could this treat-
ment proceed with adva^age simply in the light of reason ; it re-
quires the fuller light of revelation.
2. Historic View of the Idea of God. — Religion is as wide-spread
as the human family and pervades the history of the race. But re-
ligion carries with it some form of the idea of God or of some order
of supernatural existence. There is no place for religion without
this idea. This is so thoroughly true that the attempts to found a
religion without the notion of some being above us have no claim to
recognition in a history of religion. But while religion diverse ideas
so widely prevails it presents great varieties of form, es- ^^ ^^°-
pecially in the idea of God, or of what takes the supreme place in
the religious consciousness. Such differences appear in what are
68 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
called the ethnic, religions, the religions of difPerent races. Of these
James Freeman Clarke enumerates ten.' Some make the number
greater, others less. However, the exact number does not concern
our present point. In the instances of Confucianism, Brahmanism,
and Buddhism there are wide variations in the conception of God,
and e({uully so in the other ethnic religions. As we look into details
these variations are still more manifest. In view of the objects
worshiped, the rites and ceremonies of the worship, the sentiments
uttered in prayer and praise, we must recognize very wide differences
of theistic conception. The case is not really other, because so
many of these ideas are void of any adequate truth of theism.
They are still ideas of what is divine to the worshiper and have their
place in the reliffious consciousness. We can hardly
SOMETHING-'^. . ° , •'
MORK THAN think that in the low forms of idolatry there is nothing
THK IDOL. more present to religious thought and feeling than the
idol. " Even the stock or stone, the rudest fetich before which
the savage bows, is, at least to him, something more than a stock
or stone ; and the feeling of fear or awe or abject dependence with
which he regards it is the reflex of a dim, confused conception of
an invisible and spiritual power, of which the material object has
become representative."''
3. Account of Pervei'ted Forms of the Idea. — These perverted
forms arise, in part, from speculations which disregard the impera-
tive laws of rational thinking, and, in j^art — mostly, indeed — from
vicious repugnances to the true idea. AVhen God is conceived
under the form of pantheism, or as the Absolute in a sense which
precludes all predication and specially denies to him all personal
attributes, the idea is the result of such speculation as we have just
now characterized, or a creation of the imagination. In either form
the idea is just as impotent for any rationale of the cosmos as the
baldest materialism. Neither has any warrant in rational thought.
ORIGIN OF AVhen God is conceived under the forms of idolatry the
IDOLATRY. conception is from a reaction of the soul against the
original idea. The reaction is from a repugnance of the sensibili-
ties to the true idea, not from any discernment of rational thought.
This is the account which Paul gives of the source and prevalence
of idolatry." His account applies broadly to the heathen world.
*'When they knew God, they glorified him not as God, neither
were thankful ; but became vain in their imaginations, and their
' Ten Gredt Religions.
''Caird: The Philosophy of Religion, p. 177. See also, Flint: Antitheistic
Theories, p. 521 ; Miiller : Origin of Religion, p. 101.
^Eom. i, 31-25, 28.
THE SENSE OF THEISM. 59
foolish heart was darkened." Thus closing their eyes to the light
of nature in which God was manifest, they " changed the glory of
the uncorruptible God into an image made like to corruptible man,
and to birds, and four-footed beasts, and creeping things." It was
because "they did not like to retain God in their knowledge."
4. Definitive Idea of God. — A definition of God that shall be true
to the truth of his being and character is a difficult at- difficulty of
tainment. This must be ajDparent whether we study defining god.
definitions as given, or the subject of definition. God is for human
thought an incomprehensible Being, existing in absolute soleness,
apart from all the categories of genus and species. Hence the diffi-
culty of definition. The true idea cannot be generalized in any
abstract or single princi|)le. As the Absolute or Unconditioned,
God is simply differentiated from the dependent or related ; as the
Infinite, from the finite. The essential truths of a definition are
not given in any of these terms.' As the Unknowable, the agnostic
formula is purely negative and without definitive content. Abso-
lute will cannot give the content of a true idea of God. In order
to the true idea, will must be joined with intellect and sensibility
in the constitution of personality. Some of the divine titles have
the form of a definition, but are not such in fact. God is often
named the Almighty/ but this expresses simjDly his omnipotence,
which is only one of his jDcrfections. Another title is Jehovah,^
which signifies the eternal, immutable being of God ; but while the
meaning is profound the plenitude of his being is not expressed.
" God is love." ^ There is profound truth here also ; but the words
express only what is viewed as supreme in God.
The citation of a few definitions may be useful. " The first
ground of all being ; the divine spirit which, unmoved instances of
itself, moves all ; absolute, efficient principle ; abso- definition.
lute notion ; absolute end." — Aristotle. This definition conforms
somewhat to the author's four forms of cause. It contains more
truth of a definition than some given by professedly Christian phi-
losophers. " The moral order of the universe, actually operative in
life." — Ficlite. Lotze clearly points out the deficiencies of this def-
inition.'' It gives us an abstract world-order without the divine
Orderer. " The absolute Spirit ; the pure, essential Being that
makes himself object to himself ; absolute holiness ; absolute power,
wisdom, goodness, justice." — Hegel. "A Being who, by his under-
standing and will, is the Cause (and by consequence the Author) of
nature ; a Being who has all rights and no duties ; the supremo
^ Particulax'ly in the book of Job. ' Exod. vi, 3.
^ 1 John iv, 16. ■* Microcosmus, vol. ii, pp. 673, 674.
60 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
perfection in substance ; the all-obligating Being ; Author of a uni-
verse under moral law ; the moral Author of the world ; an Intelli-
gence infinite in every respect/' — Kant. "God is derived incou-
testably from good and means the Good itself in the perfect sense,
the absolute Good, the primal Good, on which all other good de-
pends— as it were, the Fountain of good. Hence God has been
styled the Being of beings {ens entium), the supreme Being {ens
siimmnm), the most pei'fect Being [ens perfectissimum s. realissi-
mum)." — Krug. "The absolute, ^^niversal Substance; the real
Cause of all and every existence ; the alone, actual, and unconditioned
Being, not only Cause of all being, but itself all being, of which
every special existence is only a modification." — Spinoza. This is
a pantheistic definition. " The ens a se, Spirit independent, in
which is embraced the sufficient reason of the existence of things
contingent — that is, the universe.'' — Wolf. These citations are
found in the useful work of Krauth-Fleming.' Some of them con-
DEFiciKNT t^iii much truth, particularly Hegel's and Kant's. The
DEFINITIONS, scrious deficicucy is in the omission of any formal asser-
tion of the divine personality as the central reality of a true defini-
tion. On the other hand, too much account is made of the divine
agency in creation and providence. This agency is very properly in-
cluded in a definition of theism, particularly in its distinction from de-
ism and pantheism, but is not necessary to a definition of God himself.
We may add a few other definitions. " God is the infinite and
personal Being of the good, by and for whom the finite hath exist-
ence and consciousness ; and it is precisely this threefold definition
— God is spirit, is love, is Lord — this infinite i^ersonal Good, which
answers to the most simple truths of Christianity.'"^ Martensen
gives the elements of a definition substantially the same.^ " God is
a Spirit, infinite, eternal, and unchangeable, in his being, wis-
dom, power, holiness, justice, goodness, and truth." ^ Dr. Hodge
thinks this probably the best definition ever penned by man.
PKRsoNVLiTY Pei'souality is the deepest truth in the conception of
THK DKKPKST God aud sliould not be omitted from the definition.
TRUTH. AVith this should be combined the perfection of his
personal attributes. All the necessary truths of a definition would
thus be secured. Hence we define thus : God is an eternal per-
sonal Being, of absolute hnozoledge, power, and goodness.^
' Vocabulary of (he Philosophical Sciences, pp. 683, 684.
' Nitzsch : Christian DocMne, p. 141. " Cht'istian Dogmatics, p. 73.
* Westminster Confession, Shorter Catechism.
•"■We give a few references, in some of which, however, we find elaborate
characterizations of God, rather than compact definitions. Watson : Thcolog-
ORIGIN OF THE IDEA OF GOD. 61
11. Okigin" of the Idea of God.
1. Possible Sources of the Idea. — We here mean, not any mere
notion of God without respect to its truth, or as it might exist in
the thought of an atheist, but the idea as a conviction of the
divine existence. How may the mind come into the possession of
this idea?
There are faculties of mind which determine the modes of our
ideas. Some we obtain through sense-perception, mental modes
Sense-experience underlies all such perception. We of ideas.
cannot in this mode reach the idea of God. Many of our ideas are
obtained through the logical reason. They are warranted infer-
ences from verified facts or deductions from self-evident principles.
Through the same faculty we receive many ideas, with a conviction
of their truth, on the ground of human testimony. There are also
intuitive truths, immediate cognitions of tlie primary reason. The
conviction of truth in these ideas comes with their intuitive cogni-
tion. Through what mode may the idea of God be obtained? Not
through sense-perception, as previously stated. Beyond this it is
not necessarily limited to any one mental mode: not to the intu-
itive faculty, because it may be a product of the logical reason or a
communication of revelation — to the logical reason; nor to this
mode, because it may be an immediate tnith of the primary reason.
If the existence of God is an immediate cognition of the reason,
will it admit the support and affirmation of logical proof?
We have assumed that it will. Yet we fully recognize son as re-
the profound distinction in the several modes of our i-ated to in-
. . . TUITION.
ideas. The logical and intuitive faculties have their
respective functions, and neither can fulfill those of the other.
Further, intuitive truths are regarded as self-evident, and as above
logical proof. Yet many theists, learned in psychology and skilled
in logic, while holding the existence of God to be an intuitive truth,
none the less maintain this truth by logical proofs. We may mistake
the intuitive content of a primary truth and assume that to be intu-
itive which is not really so. Many a child learns that two and three
are five before the intuitive faculty begins its activity, particularly
in this sphere. The knowledge so acquired is not intuitive. .Yet
that two and three are five is an intuitive truth. But wherein? Not
ical Institutes, vol. i, pp. 263-269 ; Knapp : Christian Theology, pp. 85, 86 ;
Cocker : Theistic Conception of the World, pp. 27-37 ; Martineau : Essays,
Philosophical and Theological, vol. ii, pp. 187-189 ; Christlieb : Modern Doubt
and Christian Belief, pp. 219-225 ; Shedd : Dogmatic Theology, vol. i, pp.
151-194 ; Lotze ; Microcosmus, vol. ii, pp. 659-688.
G2 * SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
in the simple knowledge which a child acquires, but in the necessity
of tliis truth which the reason affirms, in the cognition that it is, and
must be, a truth in all worlds and for all minds. That things equal
to the same thing, or weights equal to the same weight, are equal
to one another is an axiomatic truth; but it is its necessary truth
that is an intuitive cognition, while a practical knowledge of the
simple fact of equality may be acquired in an experimental mode.
The jioint made is that some truths, while intuitional in some of
their content, may yet be acquired in an experimental or logical
mode. \ So, while the existence of God may be an immediate datum
of the moral and religious consciousness, it may also be a legiti-
mate subject for logical proofs. It is a truth in the affirmation of
which the intuitive reason and the logical reason combine. Hence
in holding the existence of God to be an immediate cognition of the
mind we are not dismissing it from the sphere of logical proofs.
2. An Intidtion of the Moral Beasoti. — The idea of God as a
sense or conviction of his existence is a product of the intuitive fac-
ulty. There is an intuitive faculty of the mind — the
THERE IS AN -^ , ^
INTUITIVE faculty of immediate insight into truth. Thorough
FACULTY. analysis as surely finds such a faculty as it finds the
other well-known faculties — such as the presentative, the rej)resent-
ative, and the logical. To surrender these distinctions of faculty
is to abandon psychology. To hold the others on the ground of
such distinctions is to admit an intuitive faculty. It is just as dis-
tinct and definite in its function as the others, and just as differ-
ent from them as they are from each other. There is nothing surer
in psychology than the intuitive faculty. Of all mental philoso-
phies the intuitional is the surest of its ground. The truths im-
mediately grasped by the primary reason or the intuitive faculty
are such as the axioms of geometry, space, time, being, causation,
moral duty, and responsibility.
The reality of an intuitive faculty means neither its independ-
ence of the mental state nor its equality in all minds.
CONDITIONED It may run through a vast scale of strength, just as the
BY THE MEN- otlicr facultlcs as they exist in different minds. It is
TAL STATE. . ''
conditioned by the mental development, and may be
greatly influenced by the state of the sensibilities. Some of our in-
tuitions, such as time and space, and the axioms of geometry, are
purely from the intellect, and, therefore, quite free from such in-
fluence; but it is very different in the case of moral duty and re-
sponsibility, not less intuitional in their character. There may be
a repugnance of the sensibilities so intense as to blind the mind
to the reality of these truths. Even the more purely intellectual
ORIGIN OF THE IDEA OF GOD, 63
intuitions, such as causation itself, may be formally denied, simply
because of their contrariety to the accepted system of philosophy, as
in the instance of Hume and Mill. There is no place for the pri-
mary reason in the sensationalism which they espoused, and hence
their denial of its reality. Such are the possible repressions or
denials of the intuitive faculty, simply because it is a mental faculty
and in such close relation with the others. Like the others, it
must have proper opportunity for the fulfillment of its own func-
tions. The trained mind has a much clearer insight into axio-
matic truths than the rustic mind. The aesthetic intuitions of
the cultured and refined greatly excel those of the crude mind
whose life is little above the animal plane. The moral and re-
ligious intuitions of Paul infinitely transcended those of the self-
debased and brutalized Nero. So much is the intuitive faculty
subject to the mental state. It is none the less a reality in the con-
stitution of the mind, with its own functions in our mental
economy.
It is not only true that the intuitive faculty may thus be affected
by our mental state, but also true that our moral in-
tuitions are conditioned by the presence and activity tion condi-
of the appropriate moral feeling. Pure intellect may tionedbythe
have immediate insight into axiomatic truths, but not
into truths within the testhetic and moral spheres. Here the ap-
propriate sensibility is the necessary condition. This does not
mean that any of our sensibilities have in themselves cognitive
power, but that they are necessary to some forms of cognition.*
"It would be absurd to say that the moral affections have anyplace
in a question of natural history, or chemistr}^, or mechanics, or any
department of science ; because the moral affections have nothing
to do with the faculties or perceptions which are concerned with
that subject-matter ; but in questions relating to religion the moral
affections have a great deal to do with the actual perception and
discernment by which we see and measure the facts which influence
our decision.'"^ In like manner Hopkins distinguishes between
pure reason and the moral reason, meaning by the former the fac-
ulty of immediate insight into truths which concern the intellect
only, and by the latter the faculty of immediate insight into moral
truths, particularly the ground of moral obligation. This insight
he holds to be conditioned on a sensibility.'' It is not meant that
the moral reason is any less intuitive or rational than the pure rea-
son, but only that, as related to a different class of truths, the
' Mozley : Lectures and Other Theological Papers, p. 8.
* The Law of Love, p. 40.
64 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
moral sensibilities are necessary to its insight. That the sensibili-
ties "which condition such insight must be in a proper state or tone
in order to furnish the proper condition is clear to rational thought.
That they may be, and often are, out of such state or tone is a
fact above question. Hence neither errors of moral judgment nor
even the denial, at times, of moral duty and responsibility makes
any thing against the reality of a faculty of moral intuition. These
facts will be of service in our further discussion.
The idea of God is an intuition of the moral reason. We pre-
viously pointed out the only difference between pure
AN INTUITION fsason and moral reason — that the latter is conditioned
OF THE MORAL upou thc approprlatc sensibilities. There must be an
REASON. ^ . . r. 7i 1 T • -1 •!• •
activity 01 the moral or religious sensibilities, not as m
themselves cognitive, but as necessary to the capacity of the mind
for this intuition. The idea of God has the determining criteria
of an intuition in its universality and necessity. Of course both
are denied, but without the warrant of either facts or reason.
In disj)roof of its universality instances of atheism are alleged.
We have no dialectic interest in disputing the fact of
DISPROOF OF I'sal instances of speculative atheism, though not a few
ITS uNivER- thcists deny it. If there really are such, they can easily
SALITY. "^ J ' J J
be accounted for on the ground of facts previously ex-
plained. We have seen that sensationalism is possible as a philoso-
phy, though it leads to a denial of all intuitional truths, causation
itself, and the axiomatic truths of mathematics. We have seen that
'through a perversity of the feelings the mind may be so blinded as
not to see the most certain moral truths, or so prejudiced as openly
to deny them. We have further seen that, while the moral and
religious sensibilities are necessary to the intuition of moral and re-
ligious truth, they may be in a state of aversion or antagonism
which refuses the proper condition for such intuition. It was
shown that these facts do not in the least affect the reality of our
intuitions. So neither the possibility nor the actuality of instances
of speculative atheism can in the least discredit the truth that the
idea of God is an intuition of the moral reason. When atheism
puts itself forward as the contradiction of this truth it must be re-
minded that on the same principle it must deny all intuitive truths,
for all have suffered a like contradiction. Indeed, atheism must
deny all. No i)hilosophy which renders atheism possible can admit
the realitv of our rational and moral intuitions. Theism is entirely
satisfied with the issue at this point. It is grounded in the intui-
tional philosophy, while atheism is grounded in sensationalism, which
must deny all intuitions of the reason. The truth is with theism.
ORIGIN OF THE IDEA OF GOD. Go
The criteria of an intuition are denied to the idea of God on the as-
sumption that there are heathen tribes without this idea. Whether
there are such instances is a question of fact. Whether their actuality
would disprove the intuitive character of this idea is a question of logic.
The absence of this idea from minds in the lower grades of hea-
thenism could not disprove its intuitional character.'
-I. ATHEISTIC
The reality of intuitional ideas does not mean their heathenism
existence in infant minds, or even in the incipiency of ^^ mspRooF.
youthful intelligence. In such states there is not yet the mental
development necessary to the cognition of intuitive truths. This
might be the case with the lowest heathen respecting the idea of
God. That such minds know nothing of axiomatic truths, or of
the principle of causation, or know not that five and five must be
ten for all minds comprehending the terms, means nothing against
the intuitional character of such truths.^ So if such heathen should
be found without any religious sentiment or any idea of God it
would simply mean a lack of sufficient mental and moral develop-
ment for the origin of such sentiment or idea.
Respecting the question of fact, the proof is against the existence
of any such heathen. The profoundest students of ^o atheistic
man^s deeper nature are reaching the one conclusion, heathenism.
that he is constitutionally religious. If this is the fact, as surely
it is, only the strongest historic proof could verify the existence of
any tribe wholly without a religion. There is no such proof. The
many reports of such tribes have been discredited. Some of these
reports may have been colored by prejudice. This would be quite
natural, to minds in anywise skeptical or antitheistic. Not all
prejudice is with theistic minds. That some have been without
qualification for a proper judgment, or hasty in their conclusion,
seems clear. It is not the adventurer, or sight-seer, or explorer, or
even the student of some science of nature that has the proper qual-
ification. There might be rare exceptions in the last instance.
There is wanting the necessary knowledge of mind, the clear in-
sight into the deeper nature of man. There is no other question
on which the savage mind is so reserved or so difficult of access.
" Many savages shrink from questions on religious topics, partly, it
may be, from some superstitious fear, partly, it may be, from their
helplessness in putting their own unfinished thoughts and senti-
ments into definite language."^ This view is verified by facts.
' Morell ; Philosophy of Religion, p. 294.
^ McCosh : Intuitions of the Mind, pp. 48, 49.
^MuUer: Origin and Orowth of Religion, p. 91. See Flint: Antitheistic
Theories, p. 356 ; and Quatrefages : The Human Species, p. 474.
6
G6 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
Mtiller gives an instance in which some good Benedictine mission-
aries labored three years among native Australians without dis-
covering any adoration of a deity, whether true or false. Yet they
afterward discovered that these " natives believed in an omnipotent
Being, who created the world. Suppose they had left their station
before having made this discovery, who would have dared to con-
tradict their statements?" With such a case before us we see how
easy it is for men without the proper qualification, with a sojourn
of only a few days, with no other intercourse than through an in-
terpreter, to bring away false reports of atheistic tribes.
Sir John Lubbock formally discusses this question, maintaining
the position that among savages there are not a few
FLINT'S RK- } ^ . ° . °
viKw OF LUB- atheistic tribes — people without any religion or any
^^^^' idea of a deity.' He surveys a very wide field and
cites many authors. Professor Flint places him at the head of
writers on that side of the question : " Sir John Lubbock is, so far
as I am aware, entitled to the credit of having bestowed most care
on the argument. He has certainly written with more knowledge and
in a more scientific spirit than Bilchner, Pouchet, 0. Schmidt, or
Moritz Wagner. He has brought together a much larger number
of apparent facts than any one else on the same side has done."'
It is with this author that Professor Flint joins issue, and follows
him, "paragraph by paragraph.'"'^ It is made clear that in some
instances Lubbock mistook the full meaning of some of the authors
whom he cited ; that other authors were themselves in error. Many
authorities are cited which disprove their statements. The review
is thorough and the refutation complete.
Other profound students of this question reach the conclusion
F u R T u E II ^^^^^ ^^^^ i^®^ of God or of some supernatural being or
TESTIMONY. bciugs is univcrsal. "Little by little the light has
appeared, and the result has been that Australians, Melanesians,
Bosjesmans, Hottentots, Kaffirs, and Bechuanas have, in their turn,
been withdrawn from the list of atheist nations and recognized as
religious.'" ^ It should be noted that the peoples here named are
among tlie lowest of the race. " Obliged, in my course of instruc-
tion, to review all human races, I have sought atheism in the low-
est as well as in the highest. I have nowhere met with it, except
in individuals, or in more or less limited schools, such as those
which existed in Europe in the last century, or which may still
be seen in the present day."^ In connection with these citations
there is a thorough discussion of this question, and one thoroughly
' Prehistoric Times, chap. xv. '■' Antitheistic Theories, p. 259.
^ Ibid. , led. xii. * Quatref ages : The Human Species, p. 4:75. '/6id., p. 482.
ORIGIN OF THE IDEA OF GOD. 67
conclusive of the author's position. " We may safely say that, in
spite of all researches, no human beings have been found anywhere
who do not possess something which to them is religion ; or, to put
it in the most general form, a belief in something beyond what
they can see with their eyes." ' We thus have the authority of
two mopt thorough students of this question, and to whose judg-
ment must be conceded the utmost impartiality. In support
of his own position, Mtiller cites Professor Tiele : " The state-
ment that there are nations or tribes which possess no religion
rests either on inaccurate observations or on a confusion of ideas.
No tribe or nation has yet been met with destitute of belief in
any higher beings, and travelers who asserted their existence have
been afterwards refuted by facts. It is legitimate, therefore, to
call religion, in its most general sense, a universal phenomenon of
humanity.""
Religion even in its lowest form means the idea of some super-
natural being or beings. No fetich devotee can invest
° ° RELIGION
a divinity in a brook or tree or stone without the pre- means a the-
vious idea of its existence. The same is true up "'^"^ ^"^'^'
through all grades of idolatry. There are higher ideas of divinity
than the idol would suggest. Idolatry is born of religious degen-
eration; its lowest forms, of successive degenerations. It would
please evolutionists to find in fetichism a primitive religion, but
the facts of religious history forbid it. These facts point to a
primitive monotheism. The doctrine of St. Paul is ^ primitive
fully vindicated, that idolatry is born of religious de- monotheism.
generation from a knowledge of the true God. The most ancient
ethnic religions, however idolatrous in their later history, were
originally monotheistic. Such was the Egyptian. Renouf, after
maintaining this view, proceeds thus: '^ There are many very
eminent scholars who, with full knowledge of all that can be said
to the contrary, maintain that the Egyptian religion is essentially
monotheistic, and that the multiplicity of gods is only due to the
personification of ^the attributes, characters, and offices of the su-
preme God.' No scholar is better entitled to be heard on this sub-
ject than the late M. Emmanuel Rouge, whose matured judgment
is as follows: 'No one has called in question the fundamental
meaning of the principal passages by the help of which we are able
to establish what ancient Egypt has taught concerning God, the
world, and man. I said God, not the gods. The first characteristic
' Miiller : Origin of Religion, p. 76.
^ Outlines of the History of Religion, p. 6. Tiele also is a high, authority on
this question.
68 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
of the religion is the Unity [of God] most energetically expressed:
God, One, Sole and Only; no others with Him. He is the Only
Being — living in truth. Thou art One, and millions of beings
proceed from thee. He has made every thing, and he alone has not
been made. The clearest, the simplest, the most precise concep-
tion.''" James Legge, professor of the Chinese language ^d lit-
erature in the University of Oxford, maintains the monotheism of
the primitive religion of the Chinese.'* Monotheism is found in the
religion of the very ancient Aryans, the genetic source of the Hindus
and Persian, Greek and Roman, Teuton and Celt. In the name
Heaven-Father, under which that ancient people knew and wor-
shiped God, Miiller finds a bud which bloomed into perfection in
the Lord's Prayer. '* Thousands of years have passed since the
Aryan nations separated to travel to the north and south, the west
and the east ; they have each formed their languages, . . . but
when they search for a name for what is most exalted and yet most
dear to every one of us, when they wish to express both awe and
love, the infinite and the finite, they can but do what their old fa-
thers did when, gazing up to the eternal sky, and feeling the i:»res-
ence of a Being as far as far, and as near as near can be; the}'^ can
but combine the self-same words and utter once more the primeval
Aryan prayer, Heaven-Father, in that form which will endure for-
ever, ' Our Father which art in heaven.' " ' A few references may
be given. ^
The idea of a divine existence is a necessary intuition of the
A NECESSARY Hiiud. By E ncccssarv intuition we mean one that
IDEA. springs immediately from the constitution of the mind,
and that, under the proper conditions, must so spring. As there
is thus a necessary intuition of axiomatic, aesthetic, and moral
truths, so is there a necessary intuition of a divine existence. In-
stances of speculative atheism cannot disprove this fact. !N"or could
the discovery of atheistic tribes of heathen disprove it. We pre-
viously explained the consistency of such facts with the univer-
sality of the idea of God; and in the same manner their consistency
with its necessity is fully explained. That explanation need not
here be repeated.
The universality of the idea of God means its necessity, or that,
under the proper conditions, it is spontaneous to the moral and
religious constitution of the mind. There is no other sufficient
' Renouf : The Religion of Ancient Egypt, pp. 92, 93.
- The Religions of China, pp. 8-11. ^Miiller : Science of Religion, p. 72.
* Maurice : Religions of the World, lects. ii-iv ; Wordsworth : The One Re-
ligion, pp. 33-36 ; Eawlinson : Religions of the Ancient World, pp. 29-31.
ORIGIN OF THE IDEA OF GOD. 69
account of its universality. The account has often been attempted
on the ground of tradition. This has been a favorite only account
method with some Christian apologists who maintain or its uni-
the necessity of a divine revelation against that form of ■^'^^s^^""^-
infidelity which holds the sufficiency of the light of nature for all the
moral and religious needs of man.' As tradition is presented simply
as the mode of perpetuating the idea of G-od, this method of ac-
counting for its universality must assume a primitive revelation of
the idea. Of course no antitheistic theory could admit such an
original. Christian theists do not question the fact of such a
primitive revelation, but may with reason dispute the sufficiency of
tradition for its perpetuation through all generations. It is true
that some traditions, even without any element of profound per-
manent interest, have lived through all the centuries of human his-
tory, as, for instance, some incidents of the fall of man and the
Noachian flood; but it cannot hence be inferred that the idea of
God could be thus perpetuated. There is a wide difference in the
two cases. The difference lies in this, tliat the idea of God has
ever encountered a strong antagonism in the human sensibilities.
We have seen that on this ground St. Paul accounts for the relig-
ious degeneration from the knowledge and worship of the true God
into idolatry, and that the history of religion confirms this account.
Mere tradition could not have perpetuated the primitive revelation
against such a force. Were not the idea of God native to the hu-
man mind this antagonism of the sensibilities, strengthened and
intensified by vicious habits, would long ago have led most races to
its utter abandonment. It is this innateness of the idea that has
perpetuated it in human thought and feeling.^
Some would account for the universality of this idea through
the manifestation of God in the works of nature. In this view
there is doubtless reference to the well-known words of Paul.^
There is a further teaching of Paul on this question." The two
passages are not in any contrariety, but clearly mean different
modes of the idea of God and duty. The law written in the heart
means an intuition of God and duty in the moral reason. This is
so different from the manifestation of God in the outward works
of nature that it cannot take the same place with that manifesta-
tion in the service of those who in that mode would account for
^ We may instance Ellis : Knowledge of Divine Things from Revelation, Not
from Reason or Nature ; Leland : Necessity of Revelation ; Watson : Theolog-
ical Institutes, part i, chaps, iii-vi.
- Flint : Theism, pj). 33, 338 ; Cocker : Christianity and Greek Philosophy,
pp. 86-96. ■■• Eom. i, 19, 20. •* Rom. ii, 14, 15.
70 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
the universal idea of a God. With this distinction between the
moral reason and the works of nature as a manifestation of God,
these works address themselves to the logical reason, and the con-
clusion of his existence can be reached only through a logical proc-
ess. But the idea of God does not wait for our reasoning proc-
esses. It sjirings into life before the logical faculty gets to work,
especially upon so high a theme. Exemplifications are without
number. The heathen world is full of them. If the logical proc-
ess is disclaimed the theory is surrendered, and beholding the
works of nature becomes the mere occasion of the idea of God,
wliile the idea itself is native to the moral and religious
THK CRITERIA constitutiou of the mind. It remains true that the
Twit^ ^^^^'' universality of the idea means its necessity. The idea
therefore answers to the essential criteria of an intui-
tion in its universality and necessity.
Neither a primitive revelation, nor the logical reason, nor both
together could account for the persistence and universality of the
idea of a God without a moral and religious nature in man to which
the idea is native. "A revelation takes for granted that he to
whom it is made has some knowledge of God, though it may en-
large and purify that knowledge." ' The voice of God must first
be uttered within the soul. " But this voice of the divine ego does
not first come to the consciousness of the individual ego, from with-
02it J rather does every external revelation presuppose already this
inner one ; there must echo out from within man sometliing kin-
dred to the outer revelation, in order to its being recognized and
accepted as divine. " '^ We are not here contradicting a previous
position, that the idea of God might have its origin in either rev-
elation or the logical reason. With the truth of tliat position, from
which we do not depart, it would still be true that only with the
intuitive source of the idea could it hold possession of the soul witli
such persistence and universality. It is true that in the history of
the race we mostly find the theistic conception far below the truth
of theism ; but we have given the reasons for this fact without
finding in them any contradiction to its intuitional character.
When we consider how early this idea rises in the mind ; how per-
sistently it holds its place through all conditions of the race ; how
it cleaves to liumaiiity through all perversions and repugnances, we
must think it an intuition of the moral reason.'
' H. B. Smith : Faith and Philosophy, i>. 18.
' Wuttke : Christian Ethics, vol. ii, p. 103.
^Mansel : Limits of Religious Thought, p. 115 ; Miiller : Science of Religion,
p. 12 ; Raymond : Systonatic Theology, vol. i, pp. 247-262 ; Fisher ; Sujjeniat-
ORIGIN OF THE IDEA OF GOD. 71
3. Objective Truth of the Idea. — Our intuitions must give us
objective truth. This may be denied, but only with trdth of our
the implication of agnosticism or utter skepticism. No intuitions.
mental faculty can be more trustworthy than the intuitive. If our
intuitions are not truths, no results of our mental processes can be
trusted. Our perceptions can have no warrant of truthfulness.
Perception itself is as purely a mental work as any act of intuition.
The sense-experiences which precede and condition our perceptions
can be no guarantee against errors of result. If the mind cannot
be trusted in its intuitions, why should it be trusted in the inter-
pretation of the sense-experiences which mediate its perceptions?
Mistakes have been made in all spheres where results are reached
through a mental process, while no intuition has ever been found
in error. Whatever material experience may furnish the scientist,
and however necessary or useful it may be, yet the construction of
a science is itself a purely mental work. All logical processes are
purely mental. Mistakes are made in both experience and logic,
yet we trust our faculties in both. Much more should we trust
our intuitions. The more closely our mental processes are related
to intuitive principles the more certainly are the results true.
Hence, to deny the truthfulness of our intuitions is to discredit all
our mental faculties, with agnosticism or utter skepticism as the
result.
If theism must be exchanged for atheism, all rational intelligence
must be added to the sacrifice. Atheism can demand theism under-
nothing less. If our faculties are wholly untrustworthy, lies reason.
or if all mental facts belong to the order of material causalities, as
atheism must assume, mind as a rational agency can have no place
or part in the system. It is in this view that some Christian phi-
losophers hold theism to be the necessary and only sufficient ground
of rational intelligence. " We analyze the several processes of
knowledge into their underlying assumptions, and we find that the
assumption which underlies them all is a self -existent intelligence,
who not only can be known by man, but must be known by man
in order that man may know any thing besides."' "The proc-
esses of reflective thought essentially imply that the universe is
grounded in and is the manifestation of reason. They thus rest on
the assumption that a personal God exists." ^ " We conclude, then,
4
ural Origin of Christianity, pp. 563-575 ; Temple : Religion and Science,
lect. ii ; Van Oosterzee : Christian Dogmatics, vol. i, p. 339 ; Calderwood ;
Philosophy of the Infinite, p. 46.
^ Porter : The Human Intellect, p. 662.
" Harris : Philosophical Basis of Theism, p. 81.
72 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
from the total argument, that if the trustworthiness of reason is to
he maintained it can be only on a theistic basis ; and since this trust-
worthiness is the presupposition of all science and philosophy, we
must say that God, as free and intelligent, is the postulate of both
science and philosophy. If these are possible, it can be only on a
theistic basis. ^' ' If knowledge is possible there must be a rational
order of things in correlation Avith rational mind. On the ground
of atheism there can be no such order, and no such mind. Science
and philosophy are no longer possible, rational intelligence no
longer a characteristic of mind. Yet, after all grounds of knowl-
edge are denied, atheism proceeds to give us a rational account of
the cosmos from the initial movement in the primordial fire-mist
up to the culmination in man. Down with reason in order to a
riddance of God ; up with reason to an independence of any
rational ground of the universe. This is the demand. '' Poor
atheism . . . first puts out its eyes by its primal unfaith in the
truth of our nature and of the system of things, and then proceeds
to make a great many flourishes about 'reason,' 'science,' 'prog-
ress,' and the like, in melancholy ignorance of the fact that it has
made all these impossible. If consistent thinking were still possi-
ble one could not help feeling affronted by a theory which violates
the conditions of all thinking and theorizing. It is an outlaw by
its own act, yet insolently demands the protection of the laws it
seeks to overthrow. Supposing logical thought possible, there
seems to be no escape from regarding atheism as a pathological
compound of ignorance and insolence. On the one hand, there is
a complete ignorance of all the implications of valid knowing, and
on the other a ludicrous identification of itself with science.'"
If atheism is true, then man is out of harmony with truth, and
w,.,rv ,v, „ „ is by his own mental constitution determined to error.
MIND IN HAR- •'
MONT WITH The error to which he is thus determined is no trivial
idea, but one that has wrought more deeply and thor-
oughly into human thought and feeling than any other. Such is
the idea of God. Singular it is that the forces of material nature
should ever originate such an idea, and singular that they should
make man the victim of such a delusion and in such discord with
reality, while at the same time evolving the harmonies of the uni-
verse. Man is not so formed. His mental faculties are trust-
worthy, and he is capable of knowledge. The intuitions of his
reason are absolute truths. The intuition of God in the moral
reason of the race is the truth of his existence.
' Bowue : Philosophy of Theism, j^p. 116, 117. * Ibid., p. 265,
THE ONTOLOGICAL ARGUMENT. 73
CHAPTER II.
Proofs of Theism.
Arguments in proof of theism are of two kinds : the ontolog-
ical or a miori, and the a posteriori. Of the former
J^ ' -' . . CLASSIFICA-
kind there is really only one argument, though it is tion op argu-
constructed in different forms. Its principle or ground *'^^''^^-
is a conception of God which is assumed to conclude his existence.
The a posteriori arguments are variously named and classed. We
shall treat them under the terms cosmological, teleological, and an-
thropological, and in the order as thus named. These arguments
are inductive in logical form, and proceed from phenomena to
ground, from particulars to principle or few, from effects to cause.
The cosmological is grounded in the principle of causation, and j)ro-
ceeds with the dependence of the cosmos as the requirement of a
personal cause. The teleological takes the position of final cause,
and procesds with the evidences of rational purpose in the adjust-
ments of the cosmos. The anthropological, partly cosmological and
partly teleological in method, proceeds with facts in the constitu-
tion and history of man which evince and require, not only intelli-
gence and will, but also a moral nature in the Author of his exist-
ence. These arguments are simplo in form, and were in use in this
discussion long before the Christian era. They are open to almost
limitless elaboration, but may be presented in brief form. This
shall be the manner of our own treatment.
I. The Ontological Argument.
1. Logical Ground of the Argument. — This argument is
grounded in some primary conception of God, or in some a priori
truths, which are assumed to embody the proof of his existence.
These primary conceptions vary in different constructions of the
argument ; but the variations need not here be stated, as they
must appear in the progress of the discussion. We have no
occasion to notice the slighter shades of variation. It will suffice
that we present the argument in a few leading forms of its con-
struction.
2. Different Constructions of the Argument. — The original of
this argument is conceded to Anselm. His own construction of
74 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
it is substantially in this form : We have the idea of the most per-
fect Beinij, a Beiiuj than wliora a greater or more per-
THEANSKLMIC "' ®. mi • • i • i i i j.
c o N s T K u c- feet cannot be conceived, i his idea inciiidej, and must
''^^^' include, actual existence, because actual existence is of
the necessary content of the idea of the most perfect. An ideal
being, however perfect in conception, cannot answer to the idea of
the most perfect. Hence we must admit the actual existence, for
only with this content can we have the idea of the most perfect
Being. This most perfect Being is God. Therefore God must
exist. '
Of course this argument could not pass unquestioned. Gaunilon,
a monk of Marmoutier, was promptly forward with a logical criti-
cism." Many have followed him. One point of criticism is obvious.
We readily form the idea of purely imaginary beings. Hence act-
ual existence cannot be deduced from an}^ such idea. Anselm re-
plied, and his reply has often been repeated, that the objection is
valid with respect to imperfect or finite beings, because in their
case actual existence is not of the necessary content of the idea,
but that it is groundless as against the idea of the most perfect Being,
because in this case actual existence is of the necessary content of
the idea. This idea is not an intuitive conception. Proper analy-
sis discloses the process of its construction. There is put into it
whatever is regarded as necessary to constitute it the conception of
the most perfect Being. For this reason the actual existence of the
Being conceived must be put into the content of the idea. It is
easy to add necessary existence to the actual existence of such a
Being. But the possession of an idea merely through such a proc-
ess of logical construction cannot conclude the truth of the divine
existence.^
The argument as constructed by Des Cartes is thus summarily
coxsTRccTiox statcd I " I fiud in me the notion of God, which I cannot
BYDEscAKTKs. j^^ye formcd by my own power, since it involves a higher
degree of reality than belongs to me. It must have for its Author
God himself, who stamped it upon my mind, just as the architect
impresses his stamp on his work. God's existence follows also from
the very idea of God, since the essence of God involves existence —
eternal and necessary existence."* The last sentence, so far as it
constitutes a distinct argument, drops into the Anselmic form, and
' Anselm : Proslogion, translated, with Gaunilon's criticism and Anselm's
reply, in Bibliotheca Sacra, July and October, 1851.
* Liber pro Insipienti.
' Ueberweg : History of Philosophy, vol. i, pp. 378, 383-386.
*Ibicl., vol. ii, pp. 41, 43.
THE ONTOLOGICAL ARCJUMENT. -75
hence requires no separate consideration. To the argument, as put
in the former part of tlie citation, it is objected — just as against tlie
Anselmic — that we have ideas of purely imaginary beings, and hence
that objective reality is no implication or consequence of our mental
conception. The objection is admitted so far as it relates to ideas
of finite existences, and for the reason that the mind itself can orig-
inate such ideas ; but it is declared groundless respecting the idea
of God, for the origin of which he only is sutiicient cause.
It can hardly escape notice that this argument is inductive rather
than ontological, and really the same in its principles and method as
the cosmological argument. Nor is it conclusive. The assumption
that the idea of God cannot originate in the human mind is neither
self-evident nor provable. The conclusion of God's existence as its
only sufficient cause can have no more certainty than that primary
assumption. '
Dr. Samuel Clarke attempted a demonstration of the existence of
God mostly on a priori j)rinciples, and so far con- clarke's con-
structed an ontological argument." A brief statement struction.
of his leading principles will suffice : 1. Something has existed
from eternity. As something now is, something always was ; for,
otherwise, present things must have been produced from nothing,
which is absolutely impossible. 2. There has existed from eternity
some one unchangeable and independent Being ; for, otherwise, there
must have been an eternal succession of changeable and dependent
beings, which is contradictory and absurd. 3. The unchangeable
and independent eternal Being must be self -existent, or exist neces-
sarily. This necessity must be absolute, as originally in the nature
of the thing itself, and not simply from the demand of thought.
From these j)rinciples further deductions are made respecting the
perfections of the one eternal Being. The further attempt to prove
the necessary existence of an eternal and infinite Being from the
nature of space and time does not add to the strength of the argu-
ment. It may readily be granted that infinite space and infinite
duration are necessities of thought and realities in fact ; but they
are not such realities as require a ground in essential or infinite be-
ing. They are neither attributes nor modes of such being, and
would in themselves be the very same were there no essential being,
or no mind to conceive them.
Kant's construction of this argument is not unlike that of Clarke.
Necessary existence is the only ground of possible existence ; there-
' Saisset : Modern Pantheism, vol. i, pp. 27-64.
^ Demonstration of the Being and Attributes of God, in the Boyle Lectures,
vol. ii.
76 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
fore some being must necessarily exist. The necessary Being is
KANT'S CON- single ; is simple ; is immutable and eternal ; is the su-
sTRucTioN. preme reality ; is a Spirit ; is God.' These several points
are briefly but vigorously maintained.
We have presented only a few of the many forms in which tliis
argument has been constructed. The chief aim has been to give a
little insight, into its principles and method. Its prominence in
theistic discussion is such that it could not with propriety be omit-
KSTiMATEs OF ^^d. Estlmatcs of its value as a proof of theism greatly
ITS VALUK. differ. With some, now the very few, it is the strong-
est proof, while with others it is logically valueless. Among recent
authors, Dr. Shedd occupies in its treatment two thirds of the pages
given to the proofs of theism, while Bishop Foster dismisses it with
little more notice than to remark that he never caught the argu-
ment.
II. The Cosmological Akgument.
This argument requires the truth of three things : the principle
of causation ; the dependence of the cosmos : the inad-
REQUIREMENTS ' ^ • b • r\ 1
OF TiiK ARGu- equacy of the forces of nature to its formation. Only
"'■■'''"r- ^vitli the truth of each can the argument furnish any
proof of theism. AVith the truth of each the proof is conclusive.
1. Validity of the Law of Causation. — It is the doctrine or law
of causation that every phenomenon or event must have a cause.
Mere antecedence, however uniform, will not answer for the idea of
cause. There must be a causal efficience in the antecedence ; an
antecedence with which the phenomenon or event must result, and
without which it cannot result. Such is the idea of causation in
which the cosmological argument is grounded. Certain postulates
of the principle will be subsequently stated in order to set it in the
clearest light.
The principle of causation is a truth of the reason ; a self-evident
truth ; a truth which one mav speculatively deny, but
CAUSATION A »/ a %j %j
TRCTii OF THE tlic coutrary of which he cannot rationally think. The
REASON. principle is practically true for all men ; true in mechan-
ics, in chemistry, in the laws of geology, in the science of astron-
omy, in the conservation of energy. As a self-evident or necessary
truth, it needs no proof ; it needs only to be set in the clear light.
" Now, that our belief in efficient causation is necessary can be
made plain. Let any one suppose an absolute void, where nothing
exists. He, in this case, not only cannot think of any thing begin-
' Grounds of Proof for the Ex-istence of God : Richardson's translation.
• For fall historic information respecting this argument : Flint : Theism,
lect. ix, with notes.
THE COSMOLOGICAL ARGUMENT. 77
ning to be, but he knows that no existence could come into being.
He affirms this — every man in the right use of reason affirms it —
with the sam.e necessity witli wliich he affirms the impossibility that
a thing should be, and not be, contemporaneously. The opposite,
in both cases, is not only untrue, but inconceivable — contradictory to
reason. Such is the foundation of the principle, ex niliilo nihil fit.
But if a phenomenon is wholly disconnected from its antecedents,
if there be no shadow of a causal nexus between it and them,
we may think them away, and then we have left to us a perfectly
isolated event, with nothing before it. In other words, it is just
as impossible to think of a phenomenon which stands in no causal
connection with any thing before it as it is to think of an e^ent, or
even of a universe, in the act of springing into being out of noth-
ing. Futile is the attempt to empty the mind of the principle of
efficient causation ; and were it successful, its triumph would in-
volve the overthrow of all assured knowledge, because it would be
secured at the cost of discrediting our native and necessary convic-
tions." * The special point of value in this citation is in setting the
idea of an event in the clear light of absolute isolation from cause.
No man who is true to rational thought can think the possibility of
such an event. That he cannot is because the idea of efficient
causation is a necessary idea. No axiom of geometry asserts for it-
self a profounder necessity of thought.
Hume vainly attempted to explain the idea of causation as aris-
ing from the observation of invariable sequence in the
o ... HUME S DOC-
processes of nature." This would give its genesis in trine of
experience, and deprive it of all intuitive character, ^'^^se.
The interpretation contradicts the original necessity. If the idea
had no deeper origin, thinkers could easily free their minds from
the conviction of its necessary truth. This they cannot do. Nor
has invariability of succession any thing to do with the origin of the
idea. Back of all observation of the uniformity of events, and on
occasion of any individual fact, there is present to thought the
necessary princijile that every event must have a cause. Uniform-
ity of succession may condition the knowledge of a particular cause,
but cannot condition the idea of efficient cause. This arises im-
mediately and necessarily on the observation of the most isolated
event. '' The discovery of the connection of determinate causes
and determinate effects is merely contingent and individual —
merely the datum of experience ; but the principle that every
' Fisher : Supernatural Origin of Christianity, pp. 543, 544.
^ Inquiry Concerning the Human Understanding, sec. vii ; A Treatise of
Human Nature, book i, sec. xiv.
rs SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
event Bhould liave its causes is necessary and universal, and is im-
posed on us as a condition of our human intelligence itself." '
BROWNS DOC 1^1*0^^^ professedly finds a deeper origin of the idea of
T u INK o V cause than that given by Hume, but equally eliminates
cAisE. from his doctrine all necessity of the idea.'' Beyond
any observed uniformity of succession, there is the broader idea that
under the same conditions the past has been, and the future will be,
as the present. But so long as the principle of causation is omitted
nothing of real value is added to the doctrine of Hume, ^or is
there, apart from the omitted principle of causation, any ground
for this hypothetic extension of the idea of invariable sequence.'
The idea of cause is not completed without the element of ade-
ADEQUACY OF fpi^cy. Tlic uotiou of efficiency must rise into the
cAusK. notion of sufficiency. Any deficiency of cause would
leave the whole surplus of result as utterly unaccounted for as if
there Avere no cause. Hence the necessity of thought for efficient
causation equally requires an adequate cause — a cause which shall
account for the entire effect. This princii:)le has important implica-
tions. Could the eternity of matter and the eternal activity of its
forces be proved beyond question, and could the nebular cosmogony,
as it respects the formation of material orbs, be equally proved, these
facts would fall infinitely short of a sufficient account in causation
for life in its manifold forms, or for mind with its large rational
and moral endowments.
The idea of causation is complete only with the idea of an orig-
oRiGiNAL iii^l cause. Mostly, the term ultimate is here used for
CAUSE. the expression of the idea, but we prefer the term orig-
inal. There is no cause which satisfies the idea of causation in a
concatenation of causes, or in a series of natural events. However
long the series, each event is as much an effect as a cause. How-
ever long the chain, the first link is as really an effect as any interme-
diate or even the last link, and equally requires a cause. But a begin-
ning can have no cause under a law of mediate causation. There is
still the necessity for an original, self -efficient cause ; a cause having
forward relation to effects, but no backward relation to cause. The
cause which satisfies our necessary idea must stand back of all events
in the chain of mediate causes, and in absolute independence of them.
'^ When we speak of a cause then, and of the idea of a cause which
we have in our minds, the question to be decided is. Does this idea
' Hamilton : Metaphysics, p. 534.
' Inquiry into the Relation of Cause and Effect.
' Mill's doctrine substantially that of Hume and Brown : Logic, book iii,
chaps, xxi, xxii.
THE COSMOLOGICAL ARGUMENT. 79
demand finality, or is it satisfied by an infinite chain and series of
causes ? We assert, then, that this idea demands finality ; and
adopting the maxim, ' Causa causcB, causa causati,' we say that if
a cause goes back to a further cause, then the first of these two
causes is not a true and real cause, and does not satisfy the idea of
a cause in our minds ; and so on through ever so long a chain, until
we come to a cause which has no further cause to which it goes
back. That is our interpretation of the idea of cause, and we
say that any other interpretation of the idea is a false one, and sets
up a counterfeit cause instead of a real and true one. Let us ex-
amine what we do in our minds, in conceiving the idea of cause.
First we go back for a cause ; the natural want and oge^tg is a retro-
gressive motion of the mind. But just as the first part of the idea
of cause is motion, so the last is a rest ; and both of these are
equally necessary to the idea of cause. And unless both of these
are fulfilled in the ultimate position of our minds, we have not the
proper idea of causation represented in our minds ; but a law of
thought is violated, that law which we obey in submitting to the
relation of cause at all." '
Eternity of being is an inevitable implication of the principle of
causation. If being is a reality, being must have been „^ug^T,jQjj j^j,
eternal. Nothing can be no cause. Hence an ante- plies eterni-
cedent nothingness would mean the origin of being and ^^ ^^ ''*^'^'"'-
of the universe from nothing. This is impossible in fact, and im-
possible in thought. Being must have been eternal. " The idea of
causation applied to this universe, then, as has been said, takes us up
to an Eternal, Original, Self-existing Being. For ' how much thought
soever,' says Clarke, ' it may require to demonstrate the other at-
tributes of such a Being, . . . yet as to its existence, that there is
somewhat eternal, infinite, and self-existing, which must be the
cause and original of all other things — this is one of the first and
most natural conclusions that any man who thinks at all can form
in his mind. . . . All things cannot possibly have arisen out of
nothing, nor can they have depended on one another in an endless
succession. . . . We are certain therefore of the being of a Supreme
Independent Cause ; . . . that there is something in the universe,
actually existing without, the supposition of whose not-existing
plainly implies a contradiction. ' Kant agrees with Clarke up to this
point in the argument. He coincides with him in the necessity of
an ultimate or a First Cause, as distinguished from an infinite chain
of causes. ' The reason,' he says, ' is forced to seek somewheje
its resting point in the regressus of the conditional. ... If
^ Mozley : Faith and Free Thought, p. 20.
80 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
something, whatever it may be, exists, it must then be admitted
that something exists necessarily. For the contingent exists only
under the condition of another thing, as its cause, up to a cause
which exists not contingently, and, precisely on this account, with-
out condition, necessarily. This is the argument whereon reason
founds its progression to the original Being. . . . I can never com-
plete the regression to the conditions of the existing, without ad-
mitting a necessary being. . . . This argument, though certainly
it is transcendental, since it rests upon the internal insufficiency
of the contingent, is still so simple and natural that it is adapted
to the commonest intelligence.' " '
These are the necessary ideas of causation : efficiency, adequacy,
originality ; and these ideas require for the satisfaction of thought
an eternal being as the ground of dej)endent existences.^
2. Dependence of the Cosmos. — At an earlier day contingency
was mostly used instead of dependence for the expression of the
same idea. Leibnitz proceeded a co7itingentia muncli to the proof
of the divine existence. We use the word dej^eudence as now
preferable. The question of dependence is mainly the
TEMPORAL ORI- ^ ^ . .
GIN OK THE question of a temporal origin of the cosmos. Whatever
COSMOS. begins or becomes is dependent upon a sufficient cause
for its existence. This truth is determined by the princiijle of
causation. Science verifies the dependence of the cosmos. A sum-
mary statement of facts will show this.
We begin with man. The human race is of recent origin. The
proof is in geology and paleontology. Eemains of man and traces
of his agency are found only in a very recent geological period;
and the principles of the science determine the impossibility of an
earlier existence.
We proceed with the lower forms of life, animal and vegetable.
Science traces their history, classifies their orders, and marks their
succession in the times of their appearance. Through these suc-
cessions science reaches a beginniu^g of life, and back of it an azoic
state, and a condition of the world in which the existence of life
was imfiossible.
The nebular cosmogony, the latest and, scientifically, most
' Mozley : Failh and Free Thought, pp. 39-31.
- Porter : The Human Intellect, pp. 569-592 ; Hamilton : Metaphysics, lects.
xxxix, xl ; McCosh : Intuitions of the Mind, pp. 238-244 ; Cousin : History of
Modern Philosophy, lect. xix ; Bishop Foster : Theism, pp. 167-250 ; Diman :
The Theistic Argument, lect. iii ; Mozley : Faith and Free Thought, pp. 3-48 ;
Randies : First Principles of Faith, part ii ; Calderwood : Philosophy of the
Infinite, chap. vii.
THE COSMOLOGICAL ARGUMENT. 81
approved theory, finds a beginning of worlds. When we speak of
the nebular cosmogony as, scientifically, the most approved theory,
we mean simply as an order of world-formations. Many would see
in it the method of the divine working instead of the working of
purely natural forces. The theory starts with the assumption of
a vastly diffused fire-mist as the primordial condition of the matter
out of which the solar system and the universe were formed. By
the radiation of heat and the force of gravitation this mass was sub-
ject to a process of condensation. To this is added a rotary motion
as upon an axis. The rapidity of this motion caused many diremp-
tions — one, of a mass sufficient for the solar system. This mass
was subject to the same laws as the original whole, and in process
of time dropped off a fragment which formed itself into the remot-
est planet; and thus successively all the planets were formed. In
this same order the universe wa^ formed. This is the theory. It
is simple in idea, however difficult of any rationale on purely nat-
ural grounds. If the theory be true, all matter once existed in a
worldless state; so that there must have been a beginning, not only
of all living orders and of life itself, but a beginning of worlds and
systems of worlds.
We reach a beginning in another mode. Cosmical facts arise in
an order of succession. This is a truth of science. It
is in the facts which conclude the time-origin of the succession in
cosmos; in cosmogony; in geology; in evolution. All cosmical
theories which assume to build the cosmos through
primordial forces of nature must admit an order of succession in
cosmical facts. This succession j^ostulates a beginning. It gives
us successive measures of time, not in equal but in veritable peri-
ods of limited duration. These, however numerous and extended,
can never compass eternity. The cosmical past must be finite in
time. There was a beginning of all things.
In all beginning there is dependence. A beginning is an event
which must have a cause. All that begins or becomes is thus de-
pendent. This includes all that constitutes the cosmos from the
lowest forms of physical order up to man; for the dependence upon
causation lies not only in an original beginning, but equally in all
new beginnings and in all higher becomings.
3. Inadequacy of Natural Forces to its Formation. — We must
not under this head anticipate what belongs to the scope of the
teleological and anthropological arguments, though all argument.
would be in proper order here. The inadequacy of the forces of
nature to the formation of the cosmos appears the clearer and
stronger in the light of these arguments. It is also true tliat they
82 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
lift us to higher theistic conceptions than the cosmological argu-
ment. Still the distinction of these arguments is proper, and in
the result profitable. But when this distinction is made it should
not afterward be overlooked; nor should the cosmological be the
subject of adverse criticism because it does not attain to all the rev-
elation of God that is possible only to the three arguments. " It is
only when we have completed and perfected the idea, and when we
return to it Avith the results of further inquiry, that the idea of a
first cause becomes clothed with religious significance. Yet, in-
complete and unsatisfactory as is the mere abstract conception of a
first cause, it is still an essential part of that complex and compre-
hensive reasoning on which, as we have seen, the argument for the
divine existence rests; and it is a point of no small importance
thus to ascertain, at the outset of our inquiry, that recent science,
instead of dismissing the hypothesis, has supplied us with a strik-
ing evidence of the impossibility of excluding it from rational
thought."'
Mill, in his criticism of the "argument for a first cause," ^ really
admits the principle of causation, though the admission
cisM OF TiiK is contradictory to the determining jarinciples of his
ARGUMENT. philosophy. What, then, is the cause in which Mill
finds the origin of the cosmos? Not in any thing or being back of
the cosmos or above it, but in matter and force as permanent ele-
ments in the cosmos, and as eternal existences. " There is in nat-
ure a permanent element, and also a changeable: the changes are
always the effects of previous changes; the permanent existences,
so far as we know, are not effects at all." "There is in every ob-
ject another and a permanent element, namely, the specific ele-
mentary substance or substances of which it consists and their
inherent properties. These are not kijown to us as beginning to
exist: within the range of human knowledge they had no beginning,
consequently no cause; though they themselves are causes or con-
causes of every thing that takes place." "Whenever a physical
phenomenon is traced to its cause, that cause when analyzed is
found to be a certain quantum of Force, combined with certain
collocations. And the last great generalization of science, the Con-
servation of Force, teaches us that the variety in the effects de-
pends partly upon the amount of the force, and partly upon the
diversity of the collocations. The force itself is essentially one
and the same; and there exists of it in nature a fixed quantity,
which (if the theory be true) is never increased or diminished. Here
' Diman : The Theistic Argument, p. 97.
" Three Essays on Religion, pp. 143-154.
THE COSMOLOGICAL ARGUMENT. 83
then we find, even in the changes of material nature, a permanent
element; to all appearance the very one of which we were in quest.
This it is, apparently, to which, if to any thing, we must assign the
character of First Cause, the cause of the material universe. " '
In this manner, fairly given in the citations from Mill, he at-
tempts the refutation of the cosmological argument for the exist-
ence of God. It is regarded as a most skillful attempt. If he has
found in matter and physical force a sufficient cause of the cosmos,
then our proposition, that the forces of nature are inadequate to
the formation of the cosmos, is not true, and this necessary link
fails us; and with it the whole argument fails. It should here
be observed that, if the cause of the cosmos which Mill
' . . REQUIREMENTS
offers is the true and sufficient one, it must answer for of mill's ar-
the cosmos not only in its purely physical plane, but *^^™'*''*'^-
also for all its wonderful adjustments, for all its forms of life, and
for man himself with his marvelous endowments of mind. In a
word, it must answer for all the requirements of the teleological
and anthropological arguments as well as for the cosmological.
Mill himself recognizes this implication, and makes some little
attempt to meet its requirements, but with no confident tone or
strength of logic. But we must not yet anticipate the teleological
and anthropological arguments, though with them will come the
most thorough refutation of Mill.
If any one should think that in all this contention Mill proceeds
upon purely scientific grounds, and with rigid limita-
tion to scientific facts, he would greatly err, and con- of the cos-
sequentlv accord to his reasoning a conclusiveness to ^^^ utterly
, . 1 ., ^ ■ 1 , !■ 1 n • ?r-n m t i • INADEQUATE.
wnich it has no rightiul claim. Mill as really deals m
metaphysics as ever did Plato or Anselm, Leibnitz or Kant. The
eternity of matter and physical force, the conservation of energy,
the eternal sameness of force in quantity and kind are no scientific
facts empirically verified, but metaphysical notions, or deductions
from assumed facts. For instance, if it be assumed that matter
and force are the original of the universe as an orderly system, their
eternity must be assumed, because they could not arise from noth-
ing. This is precisely the method in which theism reaches the ex-
istence of an eternal being as the cause of the cosmos. When Mill
admits the principle of causation he is in a region of thought as
purely metaphysical as the theist when building upon that princi-
ple his argument for the divine existence. Hence we are right in
denying to the argument of Mill that kind of certainty which sci-
entific verities impart.
^ Three Essays, etc., pp. 142-145.
84 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
The theory is open to an iiuulytic testing. How is the world
AN\LYTir eonstructcd by the operation of physical force?
TKSTs. Through a process of change. There is a long succes-
sion of changes. The cause of each change is itself a previous
change. " The changes are always the effects of previous changes. "
This must be the process, if the theory is true. There is no spon-
taneity in physical causation; and every change must have its cause
in a previous change. But trouble thus arises for the metaphysics
of the theory. Such changes constitute a series; and for such a
series there must be a first change. But the theory asserts, and
consistently, that every change in the series is the effect of a pre-
vious change. There can be no first under such a law; and the
theory falls helplessly into the unthinkable and self-contradictory
infinite series. The principle of causation, and physical changes
as the whole of causality, will not co-operate in the same theory,
and the attempt to work them together must end in a destructive
collision.
There are further testings. The theory is that matter and force
are the first cause, and the original of the cosmos. Matter is con-
cerned in the theory simply as the ground of force and the material
with which it builds. Respecting this force there may be two sup-
positions: one, that it was eternally active; the other, that after an
eternal quiescence it began its own activity. Against the former
supposition there is this determining fact: the cosmical work of
this force is wholly within the limits of time. As previously
shown, the cosmos is of temporal origin; and therefore the build-
ing it could b6 only a work of time. The eternal activity of such
a force and its formation of the cosmos only in time are inconsist-
ent ideas. If we admit the eternity of force as a potentiality of
matter, still it must have been quiescent in all the eternity ante-
ceding its cosmical work.
It may be assumed that this force was eternally active, but oper-
ative as cosmical cause only in time. Assumption has large liberty,
and in this instance needs the largest. The eternal activity of such
a force and its production of cosmical results only in time are con-
tradictory ideas. The new results could have no account in causa-
tion. A long preparatory process before any appearance of cos-
mical results may readily be conceded, but the notion of an eternal
preparatory process is excluded as self -contradictory. If this force
was eternally active without any cosmical production, it must have
been eternally without tendency toward such production. How
then could it move out upon a different line and begin its cosmical
work ? This would be a new departure which could have no
THE COSMOLOGICAL ARGUMENT. 85
account in physical causation. There remains to the theory the okl
notion of a fortuitous concursus of chaotic elements into cosmical
forms.
Again, it may be assumed that the present universe is only one
of an indefinite or infinite series. An indefinite series
NO INFINITE
is such only for thought, and, however extended, is skries of
finite in fact, and still leaves us with an eternity ante- universes.
ceding the building of the first universe, which could have no be-
ginning in physical force. An infinite series of universes is a con-
tradiction— unthinkable and impossible. Hence, if cosmical causa-
tion is in physical force, that force must have begun its own activity.
There is no spontaneity in physical force. This is too sure a
truth, and too familiar, to meet with any contradiction.
' ' -^ . . NO BEGINNING
It is the truth of the inertia of matter. All activity of in physical
physical force is absolutely conditioned on the jDroper ^"''^^•
conjunction or collocation of material elements. Mill recognizes
this principle in the part which he assigns to collocation as a deter-
mining law of the action of force. When such a force is within
the proper collocations it must act ; when out of them it cannot
act. We have seen that physical force, even if an eternal poten-
tiality of matter, must have been eternally out of the collocations
necessary to any cosmical work. How then could it ever get into
such collocations ? This getting in means some action. But the
conditions necessary to the action are wanting. A cosmical begin-
ning in such a force is impossible — as absolutely impossible as the
springing of the universe out of nothing. And the attempt to find
in matter and force the first cause and the original of the cosmos is
an utter failure,
4. Theistic Conclusion. — The principle of causation remains
true. Every event must have a sufficient cause. The universe is
of temporal origin and its existence must have an adequate cause.
There is no such cause in matter and physical force. The suf-
ficient cause must have power in spontaneity ; must be capable of
self-energizing ; must have an omnipotent will. These facts do
not in themselves give us the plenitude of the divine attributes as
necessary to the sufficient cause of the cosmos, but they do point
clearly and strongly to the personality of this cause. Even the
physical cosmos points to a rational intelligence as well as to a
power of will in its cause. The principle of causation requires for
the existence of the universe a personal God. Such a causation
does not imply the quiescence of God anterior to his cosmical work.
With an eternal activity in himself, it means simply a beginning of
that form of agency by which he created the universe. There must
CONCLUSION.
86 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
have been such a beginning, whether the universe had its origin in
the personal agency of God or in the forces of nature operating in
the mode of evolution.
The theistic conclusion is very sure, though not a demonstration.
It cannot be strictly such, because with the axiomatic
principle of causation we combine the dependence of
the cosmos and the inadequacy of natural forces to its formation.
These are not axiomatic truths, but truths which address them-
selves to the logical reason. Yet the theistic conclusion is in its
certainty little short of a demonstration.
III. The Teleological Argument.
1. The Doctrine of Final Cause. — Teleology is composed of
the words reXog and Xoyog, and means the doctrine of ends, or of
rational purpose.' In the theistic argument it is the doctrine of
rational purpose or design in the construction of the cosmos, as ex-
emplified in the foresight and choice of ends and the use of appro-
priate means for their attainment. There are many
EXEMPLIFICA- ^ . , . . . "^
TioNsoFTKLE- cxemplifications of the idea in human mechanisms.
OLOGY. rpj^g microscope and the telescope have each a chosen
end, while each is wisely adapted to its attainment. The purpose
is the clearer observation of things but dimly seen, or the discovery
of things which the unaided eye cannot reach. The idea of divine
finality is of frequent occurrence in the Scriptures. Here is an in-
stance : " He that planted the ear, shall he not hear ? he that
formed the eye, shall he not see ? " " The special manifestation
of the divine knowledge is in the purpose of the ear and the eye,
and the adaptation of each to its chosen end.
This argument does not depart from the principle of causation,
LOGICAL PRiN- ^^^ bullds upou It in the special sphere of rational ends.
ciPLEs. As the dependent cosmos requires an eternal being pos-
sessing spontaneity and omnipotence of will as the only adequate
cause, so the many instances of adaptation to ends in the con-
struction of the cosmos require the agency of a divine intelligence
as the only sufficient cause.
2. Ratio7ial Ends in Human Agency. — This is so certain a truth
iLLusTRATivK that It is lu Httlc need of either illustration or verifica-
FACTs. tion. The history of the race is full of its products
and proofs. The crude implements of the paleolithic aiid neolithic
ages were the chosen means for tlie attainment of chosen ends.
The rudest hut provided as a shelter from tlie rains of summer and
the inclemency of winter is the production of human purpose. In
' Krauth-Fleming : Vocabulary, p. 510. - Psa. xciv, 9.
THE TELEOLOGICAL ARGUMENT. 87
a higher civilization, the building and furnishing of houses, the im-
plements of agriculture, the tools and machinery used in manu-
facture, the products of the manufacture, the construction and
form of the ship, the rudder for steering, the sails hung from the
yards to catch the winds for propulsion, the telegraph, telephone,
and locomotive all mean the attainment of rational ends.
We are conscious of such an agency, and easily trace the mental
process. Conceiving an end, electing its attainment, mental proc-
and using appropriate means for the attainment — these ^ss.
are the facts in the process, and the facts of final cause. Each one
is sure of such a mental process in others ; and his certainty has a
deeper ground than mere empiricism — a ground in reason itself.
For such agency we require personal mind, and on the principle
that every event must have an adequate cause.
3. Rational Ends in the Cosmos. — In the construction of the
cosmos there is an orderly and pervasive plan, correlations of part to
part, adaptations of means to ends which evince and require a divine
intelligence as the only sufficient cause. There are two aspects
of nature concerned in this argument. One appears in the orderly
processes of nature ; the other, in the special adaptations of means
to ends. In this distinction some find two arguments, while others
find one argument in two spheres.' The distinction of arguments
does not seem important, but the distinction of spheres is clearly
useful. This distinction is often made without any formal notifi-
cation.
An orderly constitution of nature is as necessary to a knowledge
or science of nature as the rational intelligence of mind.
° ORDERLY CON-
*'If, then, knowledge be possible, we must declare stitution of
that the world-ground jjroceeds according to thought- ^'*-'^"'^^-
laws and principles, that it has established all things in rational rela-
tions, and balanced their interaction in quantitative and qualitative
proportion, and measured this proj)ortion by number. ' God geom-
etrizes,' says Plato. ' Number is the essence of reality,' says Pythag-
oras. And to this agree all the conclusions of scientific thought.
The heavens are crystallized mathematics. All the laws of force
are numerical. The interchange of energy and chemical combi-
nation are equally so. Crystals are solid geometry. Many organic
products show similar mathematical laws. Indeed, the claim is
often made that science never reaches its final form until it be-
comes mathematical. But simple existence in space does not imply
motion in mathematical relations, or existence in mathematical
' Diman : The Theistic Argument, pp. 105, 106 ; Flint : Theism, p. 133 ; Janet :
Final Causes, p. 12.
88 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
forms. Space is only the formless ground of form, and is quite
compatible with the irregular and amorphous. It is equally com-
patible with the absence of numerical law. The truly mathematical
is the work of the spirit. Hence the wonder that mathematical
principles should be so pervasive, that so many forms and processes
in the system represent definite mathematical conceptions, and that
they should be so accurately weighed and measured by number.
" If the cosmos were a resting existence, we might possibly con-
tent ourselves by saying that thinsrs exist in such rela-
PROCESSES OF tlous oucc for all, and that there is no going behind
NATURE. ^i^-g ^^Q^^ gjj^ ^YiQ cosmos is no such rigid monotony
of being ; it is, rather, a process according to intelligible rules ;
and in this process the rational order is perpetually maintained or
restored. The weighing and measuring continually goes on. In
each chemical change just so much of one element is combined
with just so much of another. In each change of place the intensities
of attraction and repulsion are instantaneously adjusted to correspond.
Apart from any question of design, the simple fact of qualitative
and quantitative adjustment of all things, according to fixed laAV, is
a fact of the utmost significance. The world-ground works at a mul-
titude of points, or in a multitude of things, throughout the system,
and works in each with exact reference to its activities in all the
rest. The displacement of an atom by a hair's-breadth demands a
corresponding re-adjustment in every other within the grij? of grav-
itation. But all are in constant movement, and hence re-adjust-
ment is continuous and instantaneous. The single law of gravita-
tion contains a problem of such dizzy vastness that our minds faint
in the attempt to grasp it ; but when the other laws of force are
added the complexity defies all understanding. In addition we
might refer to the building processes in organic forms, whereby
countless structures are constantly produced or maintained, and
always with regard to the typical form in question. But there is
no need to dwell upon this point.
" Here, then, is a problem, and we have only the two principles
of intellii^ence and non-intelligence, of self-directing
INTERPRETA- '^ _ .
TioN IN IN- reason and blind necessity, for its solution. The for-
TELLiGENCE. ^^^^ -^ adcquate, and is not far-fetched and violent.
It assimilates the facts to our own experience, and offers the only
ground of order of which that experience furnishes any suggestion.
If we adopt this view all the facts become luminous and consequent.
" If we take the other view, then we have to assume a power
which produces the intelligible and rational, without being itself
intelligent and rational. It works in all things, and in each with
THE TELEOLOGICAL ARGUMENT. 89
exact reference to all, yet without knowing any thing of itself or
of the rules it follows, or of the order it founds, or of
^ _ NO ACCOUNT
the myriad products compact of seeming purpose which in blind
it incessantly produces and maintains. If we ask why
it does this, we must answer. Because it must. If we ask how
we know that it must, the answer must be. By hypothesis. But
this reduces to saying that things are as they are because they must
be. That is, the problem is abandoned altogether. The facts are
referred to an opaque hypothetical necessity, and this turns out,
upon inquiry, to be the problem itself in another form. There is
no proper explanation except in theism." ' This citation possesses
great logical force, and in our brief discussion will answer for the
argument from the orderly system of nature.
The adaptations of means to ends, of organs to functions, in
organic orders are so many, so definite, and so mani- adaptations
fest that there is little need of elaborative illustra- to ends.
tion. The ground has often been occupied, and the facts pre-
sented with the clearness of scientific statement and the force of
eloquent expression. No optical instrument equals the eye in the
complexity and combination of parts. The organs for the func-
tions of hearing, respiration, nutrition, locomotion, infinitely tran-
scend all human mechanisms. The organ of the human voice in
like measure excels all artificial instruments of sound. The venous
system with the heart is a wonderful provision for the circulation
of the blood.
Are the functions of such organs the purposed ends of their
formation, or the unpurposed effects . of their existence ? The
grossest materialism can neither question their seemingly skillful
construction, nor their peculiar fitness for the functions which
they fulfill. But materialism denies any and all finality in their
formation. Eyes were not made for seeing, nor ears for hearing,
nor feet for walking, nor hands for any of the mechanical and ar-
tistic ends which they serve. We have eyes, and so we see; ears,
and so we hear; feet, and so we walk; hands, and bo we use them
in the service of many ends. But in no instance is there any fore-
sight or purpose of the function in the formation of the organ.
What is thus held of the organs specified is affirmed of all or-
gans in the realm of living orders. Here is the point of issue be-
tween theism and materialism or any science or philosophy which
denies a purposive divine agency in the adaptation of organs to
their respective functions.
A divine finality must not here be assumed either because of the
' Bowne : Philosophy of Theis^n, pp. 66-69.
90 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
seemingly skillful construction of organs or because of their peculiar
fitness for the functions which they fulfill. It is a question for
inductive treatment; and we need a statement of the
DKFINITIVE .'
STATEMENT OF grounds upou which the induction should proceed.
FINALITY. -^Tg gj^g ^j^g following statement: "When a complex
combination of heterogeneous phenomena is found to agree with
the possibility of a future act, which was not contained beforehand
in any of these plienomena in particular, this agreement can only
be comprehended by tlie human mind by a kind of pre-existence,
in an ideal form, of the future act itself, which transforms it from
a result into an end — that is to say, into a final cause." ' The prin-
ciples here given may be set in a clearer light by the use of illus-
trations. The hull of a ship, masts, sails, anchors, rudder, com-
pass, chart, have no necessary connection, and in relation to their
jjhysical causalities are heterogeneous jjhenomena. The future use
of a ship is not contained in any one of them, but is possible
through their combination. This combination in the fully equipped
ship has no interpretation in our rational intelligence except in the
previous existence of its use in human thought and purpose. The
use of the ship, therefore, is not the mere result of its existence,
but the final cause of its construction. We give illustrations from
the same author.
" The external physical world and the internal laboratory of the
livino; being are separated from each other by impene-
FURTHER IL- ° . O -I^ J f
LUSTRATIONS trablc veils, and yet they are united to each other by an
OF FINALITY, jncrcdible pre-established harmony. On the outside
there is a physical agent called light; within, there is fabricated
an optical machine adapted to the light: outside, there is an
agent called sound; inside, an acoustic machine adapted to
sound : outside, vegetables and animals ; inside, stills and alem-
bics adapted to the assimilation of these substances: outside,
a medium, solid, liquid, or gaseous; inside, a thousand means of
locomotion, adapted to the air, the earth, or the water. Thus, on
the one hand, there are the final phenomena called sight, hearing,
nutrition, flying, walking, swimming, etc.; on the otlier, the eyes,
the ears, the stomach, the wings, the fins, the motive members of
every sort. We see clearly in these examples the two terms of the
relation — on the one hand, a system ; on the other, the final phe-
nomenon in which it ends. Were there only system and combina-
tion, as in crystals, still, as we have seen, there must have been a
special cause to explain that system and that combination. But
there is more here; there is the agreement of a system with a phe-
' Janet : Final Causes, p. 85.
THE TELEOLOGICAL ARGUMENT. 91
nomenon which will only be produced long after and in new condi-
tions,— consequently a correspondence which cannot be fortuitous,
and which would necessarily be so if we do not admit that the final
and future phenomenon is precisely the bond of the system and the
circumstance which, in whatever manner, has predetermined the
combination,
" Imagine a blind workman, hidden in a cellar, and destitute of
all intelligence, who, merely yielding to the simple need of moving
his limbs and his hands, should be found to have forged, without
knowing it, a key adapted to the most complicated lock which can
possibly be imagined. This is what nature does in the fabrication
of the living being.
" ISTowhere is this pre-established harmony, to which we have just
drawn attention, displayed in a more astonishing manner than be-
tween the eve and the light. ' In the construction of
•' ° . TRENDELEN-
this organ, ^ says Trendelenburg, 'we must either admit burg on
that light has triumphed over matter and has fashioned ^ '^auty.
it, or else it is the matter itself which has become the master of the
light. This is at least what should result from the law of efficient
causes, but neither the one nor the other of these two hypotheses
takes place in reality. No ray of light falls within the secret
depths of the maternal womb, where the eye is formed. Still less
could inert matter, which is nothing without the energy of light,
be capable of comprehending it. Yet the light and the eye are
made the one for the other, and in the miracle of the eye resides
the latent consciousness of the light. The moving cause, with its
necessary development, is here employed for a higher service. The
end commands the whole, and watches over the execution of the
parts; and it is with the aid of the end that the eye becomes the
light of the body.''"
Any denial of final cause in human agency would justly be
thousfht irrational, or even insane. On what around, „,^„„„ .„.„
O ^ o J HIGHER ADAP-
then, shall we deny final cause in the adaptations of tat ions in
nature? Certainly not on the ground that organic in human ar-
structures are any less skillfully wrought, or with less tifice.
fitness for their ends. " If it be supposed that the adaptations of
external nature are less striking than the purposive actions of men,
and give, therefore, less convincing indications of design, let the
following remarkable passage from Mr. Darwin's work on the
Fertilization of Orcliids furnish the reply: ' The more I study nat-
ure, the more I become impressed with ever-increasing force with
the conclusion, that the contrivances and beautiful adaptations
' Janet : Final Causes, pp. 42, 43.
f)2 SYSTEMATIC THEOT,OGY.
slowly acquired through each part occasionally varying in a slight
degree but in many ways, with the preservation or natural selection
of those variations which are beneficial to the organism under the
complex and ever-varying condij^ions of life, transcend in an in-
comparable degree the contrivances and adaptations which the most
fertile imagination of the most imaginative man could suggest
with unlimited time at his disposal/ " ' Darwin elaborately illus-
trates these adaptations, and thus justifies their assignment to a
place infinitely transcending all adaptations of human invention.
That he accounts them to purely natural causes, and thus theoretic-
ally denies them all finality, does not in the least affect the sense
of the jjassage in its application to the present question. There is
still the indisputable fact, and to which Darwin is witness, that
the adaptations of nature, of organs to functions in the orders of
life, infinitely transcend all the adaptations of human mechanisms.
If tliere is finality or purposive intelligence in the latter, how much
more in the former.
It may be objected that, while mind is open to observation in
FINALITY human mechanisms, it is not open or observable in the
NONKTHE LESS orgaulsms of nature. There is really no ground for
CAUSE NON- such an objection. Beyond the consciousness of one's
PHENOMENAL, q^j^ agcucy, thc evidences of finality in divine and hu-
man agency stand in the same relation to our intelligence. We
have no direct insight into the working of other minds. If one
were present with the maker of a microscope through the whole
process of its construction, nothing would be open to his observa-
tion but the physical phenomena of the work. The whole evidence
of design would be given in the constructive character of the mi-
croscope and its adaptation to the end for which it was made. In
the realm of life we have the same kind of evidence, and vastly
higher in degree, of a purposive divine intelligence in the construc-
tion of organs and their wonderful adaptation to the important
functions which they fulfill. Whatever light one's own conscious-
ness of a designing agency may shed upon the works of others,
so as to make the clearer a designing agency therein, must equally
shine upon the works of nature as the manifestation of a purposive
divine intelligence. The objection damagingly recoils. The de-
nial of a designing intelligence in the organic works of nature
because it is not open to observation requires the denial of such
Intelligence in»all human works except one's own.
4. Objections to Finality in Organic Nature. — It is objected that
there are in organic structures instances of malformation, of mon-
' Herbert : Modem Realism, pp. 315, 216.
THE TELEOLOGICAL ARGUMENT. 93
strosity even, which are inconsistent with a purposive divine agency.
The objection can have no validity except against a abnormal
false view of that agency, and therefore is groundless formations.
as against the true view. The doctrine of divine finality does not
exclude secondary causes. The forces of nature are still realities,
and operative in all the processes of organic formation. Hence,
that these forces in their manifold interactions shonld, in rare in-
stances, so modify their normal working as to produce abnormal or
even monstrous formations is no disproof of a purposive divine
agency. Modern science, however materialistic its ground, holds
firmly the uniformity of nature — even such a uniformity as can al-
low no place for a divine agency. This uniformity is held for the
organic realm of nature just as for the inorganic. Hence such sci-
ence can give no better account of these abnormities than we have
given — indeed, must give the very same account. Doubtless there
are formative forces which determine the several orders of organic
nature ; but aberrancies of development are still possible. " Limi-
tations and malformations may occur, for each living thing is not
only subject to the law of its kind, but is under the dominion of
other forces indifferent to the end and purpose of the organic indi-
vidual."' " As to the difficulty caused by deviations of the germ,
it would only be decisive against finality if the organism were pre-
sented as an absolute whole, without any relation to the rest of the
universe — as an empire within an empire, the imperium in imperio
of Spinoza. Only in this case could it be denied that the actions
and reactions of the medium have brought about deviations in the
whole. The organism is only a relative whole. What proves it is
that it is not self-sufficient, and that it is necessarily bound to an
external medium ; consequently the modifications of this medium
cannot but act upon it ; and if they can act in the course of growth,
there is no reason why they should not likewise act when it is still in
the state of germ. There result, then, primordial deviations, while
the alterations taking place later are only secondary ; and if monstros-
ities continue to develop as well as normal beings, it is because the
laws of organized matter continue their action when turned aside
from their end, as a stone thrown, and meeting an obstacle, changes
its direction and yet pursues its course in virtue of its acquired
velocity."'
A further objection is made on the ground of useless and rudi-
mentary organs. Seemingly, there are organs of the former class ;
certainly there are of the latter. Nor are they entirely without
' Miiller : Christian Doctrine of Sin, vol. ii, p. 57.
' Janet ; Final Causes, p. 131.
94 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
perplexity for the doctrine of finality. Any adequate discussion of
the question would lead us far beyond our prescribed limits. '
Kespecting useless organs : " The first are few in number in the
USELESS OR- present state of science. Almost all known organs have
GANs. their proper functions ; only a few oppose this law. The
chief of these organs in the higher animals is the spleen. It seems,
in effect, that this organ does not play a very important part in the
animal economy, for numerous experiments prove that it can be ex-
tirpated without seriously endangering the life of the animal. We
must not, however, conclude from this that the spleen has no func-
tions ; and physiologists do not draw this conclusion from it, for
they are seeking them, and are not without hope of finding them.
An organ may be of service without being absolutely necessary
to life. Every thing leads to the belief that the spleen is only
a secondary organ ; but the existence of subordinate, auxiliary,
or subsidiary organs involves nothing contrary to the doctrine of
finality."" The case is thus put in view of the chief organ whose
special function or definite part in the economy of animal life is
not apparent.
Kespecting the rudimentary : '^ There are only two known expla-
RUDiMENTARY natious of thc rudimentary organs : either the theory of
ORGANS. the unity of type of Geoffroy Saint Hilaire, or the the-
ory of the atrophy of the organs by default of habit of Lamarck
and Darwin. But neither of these two explanations contradicts the
theory of finality. We have seen, in fact, that there are two sorts
of finality — that of use and that of plan. It is by no means im-
plied in the theory that the second should necessarily be sacrificed
or even subordinated to the first. The type remaining the same,
one can understand that nature, whether by amplifying it, by in-
verting it, or by changing its j)roportions, variously adapts it ac-
cording to different circumstances, and that the organs, in these
circumstances rendered useless, are now only a souvenir of the
primitive plan — not certainly that nature expressly creates useless
organs, as an architect makes false windows from love of symmetry,
but, the type being given, and being modified according to prede-
termined laws, it is not wonderful that some vestiges of it remain
intractable to finality.
"As regards the second explanation, it can equally be reconciled
with our doctrine ; for if the organs have ceased to serve, and have
thereby been reduced to a minimum, which is now only the re-
' We refer to i^IcCosh : Typical Forms, pp. 420-439 ; and especially to Janet :
Final Causes, pp. 223-347.
" Janet : Final Causes, p. 325. «
THE-TELEOLOGICAL ARGUMENT. 95
mains of a previous state, it does not follow that they cannot
have been of use at a former time, and nothing conforms more
to the theory of finality than the gradual disappearance of useless
complications/' '
We have thought it well to present these questions mostly in the
treatment of a theist who is familiar with the facts concerned, and
both candid and capable in their logical treatment. The defense
of a divine finality in the organic realm is satisfactory.
Another objection takes the form of an inference from the work-
ing of instinct. Animal instinct is viewed as a blind working of
impulse, without prevision or plan, and yet as working I^'STINCT.
to ends. The inference is, that the adaptations of organs to func-
tions in organic nature neither evince nor require the agency of a
divine mind. This inference is tlie objection to the doctrine of di-
vine finality. In meeting this objection we are not concerned to
dispute either the characterization of instinct as a blind impulse, or
that it works to ends. Instances of the latter are numerous and
familiar. One, however, must go to the naturalists for the fuller
information.
The inference here opposed to the doctrine of final cause is just
the opposite of an a fortiori inference. An animal is a far higher
order of existence than mere matter. Animal instinct is a far
higher quality or force than any quality or force of mere matter.
Tliat animal instinct works to ends is no ground of inference that
material forces, once potential in the primordial fire-mist, could
found the orderly system of the universe, construct the organic
world with all its wonderful adaptations to ends, and create the
realm of mind with its marvelous powers and achievements. In-
deed, animal instinct, instead of v;arranting any inference adverse
to the doctrine of finality, demands finality as the only rational ac-
count of the many offices which it so wonderfully fulfills in the
economy of animal life.
The denial of rational intelligence in animal mechanisms is a cor-
rected or second judgment. It is at once manifest that mere mate-
rial forces could no more perform such work than they could wield
the pencil of Raphael or the chisel of Angclo. The immediate
judgment accounts such work to intelligence in the worker. This
a second judgment corrects ; not, however, in view of the work
wrought, but simply in view of the animal worker as incapable cf
such intelligence. This fact requires, for any validity of the infer-
ence adverse to a law of teleology in the constitution of nature, the
discovery that no being capable of such agency is operative therein.
1 Janet : Final Causes, pp. 239, 230.
96 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.-
But this is the very question in issue. The necessary discovery has
not been made ; nor can it be made. Hence the inference drawn
from the working of animal instinct against the doctrine of final
cause in the cosmos is utterly groundless.
Animal mechanisms have an artificial form, not a growth form ;
and therein they have a special likeness to human mechanisms.
Hence, if these works of instinct may warrant an inference adverse
to finality, first of all they should so warrant in the case of human
mechanisms to which they bear such special likeness. Can this
be done ? Never, as every sane mind knows. No more can they
disprove a purposive intelligence in the constitution of organic
nature.
The teleological argument remains in its validity and cogency.
NO DISPROOF '^^^ orderly system of nature, the manifold adaptations '
OF TELEOLOGY, of mcaus to cuds in the organic system, infinitely sur-
passing all the contrivances of human ingenuity, show the j^urposive
agency of a divine mind. This is the only ground for any rationale
of the cosmos. Short of a divine mind we have, at most, only mat-
ter and physical force, without any pretension of intelligence in
either. No new characterization of matter can change these facts.
Assuming for matter a second face, as some scientists do, is not
endowing it with intelligence. This is not pretended, not even al-
lowed. With its two faces it remains as blank of thought as the
old one-faced matter of Democritus. Blind force must transform a
chaotic nebula into the wonderful cosmos. Nor can it be allowed
any pause with the formation of the orderly heavens and the won-
derful organic world. Man, with all that may be called the mind
of man, must have the same original. Then all his mechanisms, all
his creations in the realms of science and philosophy and art, must
be accounted to the same blind force. All purposive agency in man
must be denied. If any one should here be stumbled by his own
consciousness of such an agency, let him account this consciousness a
delusion, and gladly, because such an agency is really out of harmony
with the continuity of physical force, which, at any and all cost,
must hold its way in the phenomena of mind, just as in the jihe-
nomena of matter. But tlie truth of a pur]3osive agency in man will
hold its place against all adverse theories of science. And so long
as a human finality is admitted in the sphere of civilization the de-
nial of a divine finality in the realm of nature must be irrational.
The truth of such a finality is the truth of the divine existence.^
'For illustrations of finality in the cosmos — Paley : Xatural Theology;
Flint: Theism, lects. v, vi ; Argyll: The Reign of Lcnv ; Chadbourne: Natural
Theology; TuUoch : Theism; McCosli : Typical Forms ; Janet: Final Causes.
THE ANTHROPOLOGICAL ARGUMENT. 97
IV. The Anthropological Argument.
This argument is sometimes called the psychological, and often
the moral argument. As it may properly deal with other matters
than the distinctively psychological and moral nature and history
of man, anthropological, as broader in its application, is preferable
to either.
This argument differs from the cosmological and teleological
more in its sphere than in its logical principles. In
,^ O I r METHOD OF
proceeding with the nature and endowments of mind the argu-
to the proof of the divine existence, the principle is ^^^'^^'
the same as in the cosmological argument. Then in proceeding
with the adaptations of mental endowment to our manifold rela-
tions, the principle is the same as in the teleological argument.
Further, there are facts of man's moral nature which clearly reveal
a moral nature in the author of his being.
1. Special Fads of Organic Constitution. — In his organic nat-
ure man belongs to the sphere of the teleological argument. But
there are some special facts of his constitution which furnish spe-
cial illustrations and proofs of divine finality, and may therefore
properly be included in the present argument.
In complexity and completeness of structure and symmetry of form
the human body stands at the head of organic exist-
•' -^ ORGANIC COM-
ences, so far as known to us. The harmony of these plktknkss oe
facts witli his higher mental nature is the reflection of ^^^^'
a rational intelligence in the author of his being. His erect form
becomes his higher plane of life and fits him for the many ofiices
which minister to his well-being. The hand is admirably fitted for
its manifold uses. It is true that many useful and ornamental
things are now made by machinery; but back of the machinery is
the hand, without which it could not have been made. So that
back of all the material products of our civilization is this same
wonderful hand. Sometimes the skeleton of this hand and that of
an ape are sketched side by side, and in the interest of evolution it
is suggested that the seeming difference is but sliglit. The idea is
that, if the primordial fire-mist could through a succession of dif-
ferentiations and integrations construct the ape's hand, then by a
little further advance on the same line it could produce the slightly
varying human hand. But the Duke of Argyll has well ob-
served that to get the real diffei'ence between the two we
must compare the work of one with that of the other. In this
view the difference is almost infinite. It might be said that the
superior brain of man accounts for this difference; but this would
98 SYSTE.MAIIC THEOLOGY.
uot give the reul truth. With oiil}' an ape's hand only the rudi-
ments of civilization could ever have been attained. The brain-
work of the great inventors could have had but little outcome with-
out the skill of the hand. What could the mental genius of
Raphael and Angelo ever have achieved without the cunning
hand to set in reality their ideal creations? The voice goes most
fittingly with the human mind. Such a voice could have no spe-
cial function even in the highest animal orders. The intelligence
is wanting for the special uses of which it is capable. That a par-
rot may articulate a few words or a bullfinch pipe a few notes of a
tune is in no contradiction to this statement. For man this voice
has many uses, and uses of the highest value. It is the ready
means of intelligent intercourse in human society. It serves for
the intelligent and intelligible expression of all the inner life of
thought and feeling and purpose, and from the simplest utterances
up to the highest forms of eloquence and song. The organ Avhich
makes possible this voice in all its high uses is as wonderful as the
voice itself.
It is impossible to account for the perfect harmony of these facts
without a ruling mind. These notable facts, the erect
TH^if^FACTs posture, the cunning hand, and the voice, with the or-
oNi.Y FROM IN- frQ,jx wliicli makcs it possible, how else could they come
T£LLIG£NCF o a »/
separately and into such happy harmony with the men-
tal grade of man ? In the absence of such a mind the only resource
is in matter and force, and a process of differentiations and integra-
tions, and the influence of the environment. But down in this
plane every force is blind, utterly blind. Here there can be no pur-
posive agency. Then fortuity or necessity is all that remains.
Fortuity is too absurd for any respectful consideration. To allege
such a necessity is to assume for matter and physical force qualities
utterly alien to their nature. A ruling mind is the only rational
account of the special facts we have found in the organic constitu-
tion of man.
3. Rational Mind a Spiritual Essence. — Phenomena must have
a ground in essential being. Outright nihilism is outright hallu-
cination. All qualities, properties, attributes, all proc-
BKING THK -, l- £ i. \ 1 • 1
NECKssARY ©^s, chaugc, Hiotiou, lorce, must have a ground m be-
GRouNDOP ing. Idealism may question or even deny the reality
of a material world, but on such denial must posit
something essentially real as the ground of the sensations which
seemingly arise from the presence and influence of such a world.
In the definition of matter as the permanent possibility of sensa-
tions Mill really admits the necessity of some substantial ground of
THE ANTHROPOLOGICAL ARGUMENT. 9j
such sensations. The agnosticism which posits the infinite or ab-
solute as the ground of finite existences, and then pushes it away
beyond all reach of human knowledge, must still hold the essential
reality of such ground. We have no immediate insight into being,
but our reason affirms its reality as the necessary ground of phe-
nomena. "We could just as reasonably deny the fact of a phe-
nomenal world as to deny to it an underlying reality of being.
Whatever else we may question or deny, unless utterly lost in the
hallucinations of nihilism, we must concede reality of existence to
the conscious subject of sensations and percipient of phenomena.
Extension, form, inertia, divisibility, thought, sensibility, spon-
taneity must have a ground in being.
Being and its predicates, whether of properties, agency, or phe-
nomena, must be in scientific accordance. The same principle may
be put in this form: Being and its predicates cannot be in contra-
dictory opposition. There may be such opposition simply in one's
affirmation, but cannot be in the reality of things. This is not
a truth empirically discovered, but is a clear and certain truth
of the reason. The mind to which it is not clear and certain is
incapable of any j)rocesses of thought properly scientific. It fol-
lows from the same principle that all predicates of the „„^„„,.„^
same subject must admit of scientific consistency, and agreement of
must exclude all contradictory opposition. ' If two pred- '"^^'''f'^i''^^-
icates of the same thing are in such opposition, then what is af-
firmed in the one is really denied in the other. To say of the same
thing that it is at the same time both cubical and spherical in fig-
ure is to violate the law of contradiction as completely as to say
that a thing is and is not at the same time. To predicate inertia
and spontaneity of the same subject is to affirm of it contradictory
properties, which must refuse all scientific consistency. These
principles are intimately related to the question concerning the nat-
ure of the ground of mental facts.
We have what we may call physical facts or phenomena, and also
what we may call mental facts or phenomena. The
most groveling materialism can hardly deny a very e^ce^o'/^ma-
marked difference between the two classes. In those terial and
related to matter we have the properties of extension,
figure, inertia, divisibility, chemical affinity. In those relating to
mind we have thought, reason, sensibility, consciousness, sponta-
neity. The two classes have nothing in common, and must refuse
all combination in either physical or mental science. If any one
denies or doubts this, let him attempt the combination. Will
thought combine with extension, reason with figure, sensibility
100 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
with divisibility, consciousness with chemical affinity, spontaneity
with inertia in any scientific construction? No material elements
or animal orders differ so widely as do the facts of mind from the
facts of matter. Material elements and animal orders do not differ
Bo much. Optics and acoustics are different sciences, and must
be because of the difference of phenomena. Chemistry and zoology
are different sciences, and must be for the same reason. So the
facts of mind cannot be scientifically combined with the facts of
matter, not even in the utmost generalization of science. Tlieir
difference is not a mere unlikeness, but a face-to-face opposition.
For this reason the two classes cannot become predicates of the
same subject. They are in contradictory opposition, and therefore
what one class would affirm of the subject the other would deny.
Mental facts cannot be the predicates of matter because they are
contradictory to its nature as revealed in its physical properties.
Spiritual mind must be the ground of mental facts.
It is beginning to be conceded that matter as traditionally known
cannot be the ground of mental facts. Respecting naturalistic
CONCESSION OF evolutlon: ^' For what are the core and essence of this
TYNDALL. hypothcsis? Strip it naked, and you stand face to face
with the notion that not alone the more ignoble forms of animal-
cular or animal life, not alone the noble forms of the horse and lion,
not alone the exquisite and wonderful mechanism of the human
body, but that the mind itself — emotion, intellect, will, and all
their phenomena — were once latent in a fiery cloud. Surely the
mere statement of such a notion is more than a refutation."
** These evolution notions are absurd, monstrous, and fit only for
the intellectual gibbet, in relation to the ideas concerning matter
which were drilled into us when young. " ' It follows that either
naturalistic evolution must be abandoned or matter must be newly
defined. Spirit and matter must be considered '' as two opposite
faces of the self-same mystery." " Any definition which omits life
and thought must be inadequate, if not untrue."''
Here is a demand for a far more radical change in the definition
of matter than is required in the interpretation of Gen-
A^^RADicAL 6s^3 i'^ order to adjust it to the discoveries of modern
CHANGE OF scicnce. But what is gained by the new definition?
MATTi.R. rpj^^ difficulties of materialism are not diminished. If
life and thought must be included in order to provide for natural-
istic evolution, tlicn they must be original and permanent qualities
of matter, and must have belonged to it just as really in the pri-
mordial fire-mist of science as in the present living organism and
'Tyndall: Fragments of Science, pp. 453, 454. ^Ibid., pp. 454, 458.
THE ANTHROPOLOGICAL AEGUMENT. loi
the thinking mind. Of course there could be no actual or phe-
nomenal existence of either. The substitution of a latent or poten-
tial form for an actual form would not relieve the case^ because
they must none the less have been real properties of matter in that
primordial state in order to their development into actual form.
The notion of a double-faced matter is equally fruitless of any re-
lief. One face represents the mental facts; the other, the physical
facts. According to this view the two classes of facts must have
the very same ground — that is, must be predicates of the same
essence of being. But their contrariety makes this impossible. As
we previously pointed out, some of them are in contradictory op-
position. The same subject cannot possess the qualities of spon-
taneity and inertia. There is no relief in any resort to a mere po-
tential or latent state. Mental facts must have a ground in spirit-
ual being.
3. Material Genesis of Mind an ImpossiWdty. — Nothing can
arise out of matter not primordially in it. This is really conceded
by the call for a new definition of matter which shall include in it
the ground of mental facts. The notion that any thing not primordi-
ally in matter should arise out of it is contradictory to all rational
thinking, and equally contradictory to the deepest principles of natu-
ralistic evolution. How then shall we account for mind ?
There might be assumed an eternally existent spirit- ofaTkternal
ual essence, iust as there is assumed an eternally exist- spiritual ex-
ISTENCE
ent material nature. This would avoid the direct dif-
ficulty of deriving mind from matter, or of finding in matter the
ground of mental facts, but the new position would be open to
much perplexing questioning. Did this assumed spiritual essence
originally exist in separate portions or in a mass ? If the latter,
how comes its individuations into distinct personalities ? If the
former, how comes their mysterious union with human bodies ?
What is the law of affinity whereby a portion of the spiritual es-
sence assumes each newly forming human body, or each body ap-
propriates a spiritual mind ? It would be easy to answer that on
any theory the facts of mind are a mystery. It is just as easy to
reply, and with all the force of logic, that the facts of mind are not
contradictory and absurd on the ground of theism as they must be
in any purely naturalistic theory. With a divine Creator of mind
we have a sufficient account of its origin and personality. This is
the only sufficient account. Human minds, with their only pos-
sible origin in a creative agency of God, affirm the truth of his ex-
istence.
The impossibilit}^ of a material genesis of mind is deeply empha-
102 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
Bized by the character and grade of its powers. We have previously
shown that there are not only marked differences, but
LOfTY GRADK . ''
OKMKNTAL facc-to-facc contrarieties between these powers and
POWERS. ^YiQ properties of matter. When studied in their in-
tellectual and moral forms and traced to the height of their own
scale, the more certain is the impossibility of a material source, and
with the deeper emphasis do they atiirm the existence of a personal
God as their only sufficient original.
There is no occasion to expatiate upon the intellectual j)Owers.
The history of the race is replete with their achievements. In the
multiform mechanisms which minister to our present life, in the
inventions which give us power over the forces of nature and make
them our useful servants, in the sciences which so broaden the
knowledge of nature and open its useful resources, in literature and
philosophy, in the creations of poetic and artistic genius, we see
their wonderful productions. These achievements s^jring from
powers which can have no basis in physical nature.
If we deny the reality of mind as a spiritual essence, separate and
distinct from matter, then we must hold the potential
SnCH POWERS . . . ...
NOT FROM MAT- existcncc of the mental faculties, with all their achieve-
''^'^' ments, in the primordial fire-mist, and as one in nature
with the physical forces therein latent or operative. This is the
assumption of naturalistic evolution. '"But the hypothesis would
probably go even farther than this. Many who hold it would
probably assent to the position that, at the present moment, all our
philosophy, all our poetry, all our science, and all our art — Plato,
Shakespeare, Newton, and Eaphael — are potential in the fires of the
sun.'" Surely this is- a case of great credulity. Nor can we see
that the believers in such potentialities of the primordial fire-mist
are any less credulous. There is no support of empirical proof in
either case. It is accepted as the implication or requirement of a
mere hypothesis. In the light of reason our philosophy, and
poetry, and science, and art are not now potential in the fires of
the sun. Nor were they potential in the primordial fire-mist of sci-
ence. In either case matter and physical force are the Avhole con-
tent. The force is of the nature of its material basis. Can this force
transmute itself into intelligence, sensibility, and will — into person-
ality— and betake itself to the study of philosophy, and the construc-
tion of the sciences, so as to trace its own lineage back throrgh an
unbroken series of physical causalities to the fire-mist of which it
was born ? This transcends the utmost reach of theistic faith, how-
ever possible it may seem to the faith of naturalistic evolutionists.
' Tyudall : Fra(jmcnts of Sricnce, p. 453.
THE ANTHROPOLOGICAL ARGUMENT. 103
" The question is this : How, in a nature without an end, does
there appear all at once a being capable of pursuing an argument ok
end ? This capacity, it is said, is the product of his •'^^'^t.
organization. But how should an organization, which by hypothe-
sis would only be a result of physical causes happily introduced,
give birth to a product such that the being thus formed could
divine, foresee, calculate, prepare means for ends ? To thi^ point
the series of phenomena has only followed the descending course,
that which goes from cause to effect; all that is produced is pro-
duced by the past, without being in any way determined, modified,
or regulated by the necessities of the future. All at once, in this
mechanical series, is produced a being that changes all, that trans-
ports into the future the cause of the present — that is capable, for
instance, having beforehand the idea of a town, to collect stones
conformably to mechanical lawSj yet so that at a given moment
they may form a town. He is able to dig the earth, so as to guide
the course of rivers ; to rej^lace forests by crops of grain ; to bend
iron to his use — in a word, to regulate the evolution of natural
phenomena in such a way that the series of these phenomena may
be dominated by a future predetermined phenomenon. This is
indeed, it must be confessed, a final cause. Well, then, can it be
conceived that the agent thus endowed with the power of co-ordi-
nating nature for ends is himself a simple result that nature has
realized, without proposing to itself an end ? Is it not a sort of
miracle to admit into the mechanical series of phenomena a link which
suddenly should have the power to reverse, in some sort, the order
of the series, and which, being itself only a consequent resulting
from an infinite number of antecedents, should henceforth impose
on the series this new and unforeseen law, which makes of the con-
sequent the law and rule of the antecedent ? Here is the place to
eay, with Bossuet : ' One cannot comprehend, in this whole that
does not understand, this j)art that does, for intelligence cannot
originate from a hrute and insensate thing.""
That this lucid and logically cogent passage deals so directly with
the question of final cause does not make it less applicable to the
present point. It proceeds and concludes with the impossibility of
a material genesis of our faculties of intelligence.
The moral faculties rise to the highest grade of mental endow-
ment. As rational intelligence rises above the highest ^^g^j^jQi^y ^p
forms of sentience and instinct, so the moral nature the moral
rises above the purely intellectual nature. The moral
reason, the conscience, the sense of God and duty are the crown of
' Janet : Final Causes, pp, 149, 150.
104 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
mental endowments. When the life is ordered according to mord
principles and in obedience to moral motives, it rises to its highest
form. This fact commands the assent and homage of mankind.
Such a life is possible, and has often been exemplified. In many
instances conscience and duty have been supreme — supreme over
all the allurements of the world, and even at the cost of life. Such
lofty souls belong to a higher realm than the physical. Their lives
have no limitation to an earthly horizon ; their clear vision grasps
the infinite and tho divine. The life of such souls is a free and
holy obedience to the law of duty, not the determination of phys-
ical force. Yet such souls live simply according to the moral
nature with v,'hich they are endowed, nothing above it. Such a
moral nature belongs to the constitution of man ; and our life is
true to this nature, and therefore true to ourselves, only when it
takes this higher form. Nov/, is such a life possible on materialistic
ground ? AVe have seen how utterly impossible it is to account
for our intellectual life on such ground. Much loss can we thus
account for this higher moral life, or for the mental endowments
which render it possible. The ground of such endowments must be
a spiritual mind, with its only possible origin in a divine creation.
The moral facts of mind are thus the proof of the divine existence.
4. Mental Adaptaiions to Present delations. — That knowledge
is possible is one of the most wonderful of known facts.
PROVISIONS
FOR KNowL- That it is possible we know as a fact. The deep mys-
^°^^* tery lies in the mode of our knowing. Yet this mys-
tery does not conceal the fact that we have faculties of knowledge
in wonderful adaptation to our present relations. A little study
of the facts concerned in the question must lead us up to a divine
intelligence as the only sufficient original of these provisions.
AVe proceed on the assumption of a spiritual mind in man. This
mind which is the knowing agent is in essence and attributes the
opposite of matter. It is enshrined in a physical organism which
shuts it in from all direct contact with the outer world. Here we
meet tho provisions for such contact as renders knowledge possible.
Here are the sense-organs and the brain, with their relation to each
other, and the relation of the mind to both. The sensations neces-
sary to knowledge are thus rendered possible. Any material change
in any of those provisions might prevent the sensations or so mod-
ify them as to render knowledge impossible. Further, the mental
faculties muet be capable of so interpreting those sensations as to
reach a knowledge of the external world. What is the original of
these adjustments ? Their very remarkable character cannot be
questioned. Nothing can seem more complex or difficult. The
THE ANTHROPOLOGICAL ARGUMENT. 105
fitting of part to part in the most elaborate and complicated meclian-
ism is too open and simple to be brought into any comparison.
The only alternative to a divine original of these wonderful pro-
visions is a blind physical force. Its utter inadequacy is manifest
in the light of reason. Only a divine intelligence can be the
original of such facts.
There are other facts which vitally concern the possibilities of
knowledge. Here is a profound fact. The mental fac-
° . ^ . . POSSIBILITY OB'
ulties must be in proper adjustment to the realities of science and
nature. The mind might have been so constituted as ^^^^^^^ophy.
to be capable of knowing only individual things. In this case no
scientific knowledge would have been possible. Nor could any relief
come from all the orderly forms of nature. On the other hand, ra-
tional faculties could not of themselves make any science possible.
For any such result the orderly and rational forms of nature are just as
necessary as the proper rational cast of the mental faculties. Hence
the necessity for the proper adjustment between these faculties and
the realities of the world. IN'o science could else be possible. For
knowledge every thing would be purely individual. There could be
no genera or species, classes or families ; no abstraction or general-
ization ; no philosophy. The Comtian positivism, low as it is, is a
lofty height compared with such a state. Any noble manhood of
the race would be impossible. If subsistence were possible, the
merest childhood of the race would be perpetual. The harmony of
our rational faculties with the rational forms of nature is the possi-
bility of science in its many spheres. Thus comes the elevation of
man, the broad knowledge of nature, the sciences with their mani-
fold utilities in our civilization, and the philosophy which under-
lies all true knowledge. There is a cause for all these facts — the ra-
tional cast of mind, the rational forms of nature, and the harmony
of the one with the other, so that knowledge in its manifold forms
is possible. Again, there are the only two alternative resources: blind
force, or a divine intelligence. The utter inadequacy of the former
excludes it. The facts j)rove the existence of a divine intelligence
as the only rational account of themselves.
The sensibilities are as remarkable for their adaptation to ends as
the mental faculties or the badily organs. Mere Intel- the sensibiu-
Icctual faculties could not fit us for the present life, ties for ends.
The springs of action are in the sensibilities. In them are the im-
pulses to forms cf action necessary to the present life. Inquisitive-
ness and acquisitiveness both have their impulse in the appropriate
sensibilities. Without the former there could be but little attain-
ment in knowledge ; without the latter, no necessary accumulation
lUO SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
of property. The domestic affections are the possibility, and the
only possibility, of the family. Neither wealth, nor station, nor in-
tellect, nor culture, nor all combined can make the home. Love
makes the home. The home is the profoundest necessity and the
crowning benediction of human life. Some good agency, with wise
intent, must have ruled the deep implanting of that love in the
human soul which creates and blesses the family, and blesses man-
kind in this blessing. Society and the State are possible only
through the api^ropriate sensibilities. These are richly provided in
the constitution of human nature. There is the social affection
which finds satisfaction in the fellowship of others. There arc all
the kindly affections which are the life and beauty of society. Pa-
triotism, native to the human soul, is the life and strength of the
State. The aesthetic sensibilities open to us a world of beauty and
pleasure in the forms of nature and the creations of artistic genius.
Is all this mere fortuity, or the work of physical force ? It cannot
be. In those endowments of mind which so widely and beneficently
provide for so many interests of human life we see the purposive
agency of a divine intelligence.'
5. Proofs of a Moral Nature in God. — In natural theology the
chief proofs of a moral nature in God are furnished in the moral
constitution and history of man. There is some light from a lower
plane : for instance, in the provisions for happiness in the sentient,
intellectual, and social forms of life. As provisions above all the
requirements of subsistence, happiness must be their end. Hence
their author must be of benevolent disposition and aim. We could
not assert an absolute impossibility of benevolence apart from a
moral nature. Conceivably, there might be generous and kindly
impulses in a nature without moral endowment. But in the facts
of human history we see that benevolence, especially in its higher
forms, is ever regarded, not only as praiseworthy, but as morally
good. This is certainly the case when we recognize benevolence as
the constant and ruling aim. Such we must think the benevolence
of God in the many provisions for the happiness of his creatures.
Thus in God, as in man, we find in a moral nature the source of
such benevolence. However, it is still true that in the moral consti-
tution and history of man we find the chief expression and proof of
a moral nature in God. Of course, we here view the question en-
tirely apart from the Scriptures as a supernatural revelation from
God.
In the present argument we require the proof of two things :
' Chalmers : Moral and Intellectual Constitution of Man, part ii ; McCosh ;
Typical Forms, pp. 440-492.
THE ANTflROPOLOGICAL ARGUMENT. 107
fiist, that man is constituted witli a moral nature; and, second,
tiiat the moral nature of man is the proof of a moral
nature in God. of thk argu-
We study the mind in its phenomena, and thus reach ^^^^'
a knowledge of its endowments. This is the common method of
science. We thus find the mind to be rationally constituted. This
is one of the certainties of psychology. In like man-
ner we determine the several forms of intellectual fac- ment of men-
ulty. In the same manner we find the mind to be con- tal endow-
stituted with sensibility, and distinguish the different
forms of feeling. Further, v/e find the choosing of ends and volun-
tary endeavors toward their attainment, and determine the mind to
be endowed with a faculty of will. The several classes of mental
phenomena are conclusive of these several forms of mental endow-
ment. No phenomena of mind are more real, or constant, or com-
mon than the phenomena of conscience. But conscience means a
moral nature, and can have no psychological explication without such
a nature. Thus Avith the utmost certainty of scientific induction we
reach the truth of a moral constitution of the mind. The phenom-
ena of rational intelligence, of feeling, and of volition, which reveal
themselves in the consciousness, no more certainly determine the
mental endowments of intellect, sensibility, and will than the phe-
nomena of conscience determine the moral constitution of the
mind. Further statements may set this truth in a yet clearer light.
The history of the ages, the religions of the world, philosophy
and poetry witness to the profound facts of conscience proofs of a
in human experience. The profoundest students of our conscience.
mental nature unite in this testimony. Conscience is present in all
minds, and asserts its right to rule all lives. This right is not dis-
puted, however its authority may be resisted. In the sensibilities
there are many incitements to action, and, in the absence of a su-
preme law, the question as to which should prevail would be
merely a question of secular prudence. " But there is a superior
principle of reflection or conscience in every man, which distin-
guishes between the internal principles of his heart, as well as his
external actions ; pronounces determinately some actions to be in
themselves just, right, good ; others to be in themselves evil, wrong,
unjust : which, without being consulted, without being advised
with, magisterially exerts itself, and approves or condemns him, the
doer of them, accordingly." "Thus, that principle by which we
survey, and either approve or disapprove, our own heart, temper, and
actions, is not only to be considered as what is in its turn to have
some influence ; which may be said of every passion, of the lowest
108 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
appetites : but likewise as being superior ; as from its very nature
manifestly claiming superiority over all others : insomuch that you
cannot form a notion of this faculty, conscience, without taking in
judgment, direction, superintendency. This is a constituent part
of the idea, that is, of the faculty itself, and, to preside and gov-
ern, from the very economy and constitution of man, belongs to it.
Had it strength, as it has right ; had it power, as it has manifest au-
thority, it would absolutely govern the world." ' " Every man has
conscience, and finds himself inspected by an inward censor, by
whom he is threatened and kept in awe (reverence mingled with
dread) ; and this power, watching over the law, is nothing arbitra-
rily (optionally) adopted by himself, but is interwoven Avitli his
substance."''
While conscience is thus at once the central fact and the proof of
a moral nature in man, it is the clear proof of a moral
THE PROOF OF i -i i t j. • •
A MORAL NAT- naturo in God. " Hence, while the direct function of
CRE IN GOD. conscience is to discriminate the right and wrong in
actions, while its immediate sphere is the human will, it goes far
beyond this. In fact, it can perform those functions only in this
way. It carries the soul outside of itself, and brings the will before
a bar independent of its own impulses. It inevitably awakens in
the soul the perception of a moral law, universal, unchangeable,
binding under all circumstances ; in short, of a moral order of the
world analogous to the physical order which it is the province of sci-
ence to trace and illustrate. The moral consciousness of man refuses
to stop short of this conclusion. Man feels himself, not merely re-
lated to physical laws, but even more closely and more vitally related
to moral la"\vs, laws which" not only enter into the structure of his
own being, and go to form the frame-work of human life, but laws
which extend beyond himself and his own hopes and struggles, and
assert themselves as every-where supreme. Such recognition of the
moral order of the Avorld is not only the highest, but the only con-
clusion that can satisfy the educated moral consciousness of man-
kind." =
" Now it is in these phenomena of Conscience that Nature offers
to us far her strongest argument for the moral character of God.
Had he been an unrighteous being himself, would he have given to
this, the obviously superior faculty in man, so distinct and author-
itative a voice on the side of righteousness ? . . . He would never
have established a conscience in man, and invested it with the
' Butler: Fifteen Sermons, sermon ii.
'^Kant: Mctaphysic of Ethics, p. 245.
=^Diman : The Theistic Argument, pp. 248, 249.
THE ANTHROPOLOGICAL ARGUMENT. 109
authority of a monitor, and given to it those legislative and judicial
functions which it obviously possesses ; and then so framed it that
all its decisions should be on the side of that virtue which he him-
self disowned, and condemnatory of that vice which he himself ex-
emplified. This is an evidence for the righteousness of God, which
keeps its ground amid all the disorders and aberrations to which
humanity is liable. " '
Thus in the moral consciousness of man there is the recognition
of a moral law of universal obligation, and also of a supreme moral
ruler to whom we are responsible. The moral nature of man is
thus the manifestation of a moral nature in God. In the cos-
mological argument we found in the existence of the cosmos, as
a world originating in time, conclusive proof of the existence of an
eternal and infinitely potential being as its only sufficient cause.
On the same grounds we found that this being must possess the
power of self -energizing — must indeed possess an infinite potency
of will. In the teleological argument we found in the adaptations
of fneans to ends the proofs of a divine intelligence as their only
sufficient cause. Then in grouping these truths thus attained we
already have the proof of the divine personality. This same truth
is confirmed by the nature and faculties of the mind as presented
in the anthropological argument. The moral nature of man is his
highest endowment and the crowning proof of his divine original.
It is specially the manifestation of a moral nature in God ; and the
truth of a moral nature in God is the truth of his holiness, justice,
goodness.
' Chalmers : Moral and Intellectual Constitution of Man, vol. i, pp. 85, 86.
no SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
CHAPTER III.
ANTITHEISTIC THEORIES.
Theism means the existence of a personal God, creator and ruler
of all thinsfs. Any theory, therefore, which excludes or
TioNOKTHK- OHiits thcsc couteuts of the doctrine is thereby deter-
oRiEs. mined to be antitheistic. There are differences in the
analysis and classification of such theories. We think that all may be
properly classed under five terms: atheism, pantheism, positivism,
naturalistic evolution, agnosticism. This omits materialism, one
OMISSION OF of the most common terms in the usual classifications.
MATKRiALisM. Thorc Is a sufficient reason for its omission in the fact
that two or three of the theories named are grounded in materialism.
This is openly true of atheism. It is really true of naturalistic evolu-
tion. The attempt of some evolutionists to change the definition of
matter so as to provide for vital and mental phenomena rather con-
cedes than disputes this fact. Positivism would be materialistic but
for its rigid self-limitation to the sheerest phenomenalism. It is
certainly nothing higher. Secularism is so closely kindred to posi-
tivism that it requires no separate classification. No elaborate dis-
cussion or refutation of these several theories is intended. The
chief aim is to point out their antitheistic elements. Mostly, their
refutation lies in the proofs of theism, as previously adduced.
\. Atheism.
1. Meaning of Atheism. — After the analysis and classification of
antitheistic theories each should have its own place in the further
treatment. Atheism should thus be restricted, and none the less so
because other theories may have atheistic elements. They still
possess some peculiar characteristics as antitheistic theories, and
which differentiate them from outright atheism. This is the form
of atheism with which we are now concerned. It means the open
and positive denial of the existence of God. There may be a skep-
tical atheism, and there is often such a designation of atheism ;
but in such a state of mind there is the absence of any proper
theistic faith rather than the presence of any positive disbelief
of the divine existence. Such a state of mind goes with other
antitheistic theories rather than with atheism in its own distinct-
ATHEISM. 1 1 1
ive sense. Dogmatic atheism, such as we here consider, must
be thoroughl}^ materialistic, or must lapse into the merest phenom-
enalism.
It is still a question in dispute whether there are now, or ever were,
any real instances of speculative or dogmatic atheism, actuality of
Such atheism is not a mere ignorance of the divine exist- ai'"k's»i-
once, as in a state of mind in which the idea has never been present. A
dogmatic atheist is one to whose mind the idea is present ; one who
assumes to have considered the evidence in the case, and who still
positively denies the existence of Grod. Profound thinkers, and
profound students of questions directly relating to this issue, deny
that there ever Avas an instance of such atheism. Others dissent.
We think their position the true one. In the possible aberrancies
of the mind there is the possibility of atheism. Yet the instances
are either rare or transient. Atheism is mostly sporadic, and can-
not broadly possess the mind of a community except in such favor-
ing conditions as were furnished in the frenzy of France in the
time of the Eevolution. If the history of the past throws light upon
the future, atheism must ever be sporadic, or only a transient
mania. The moral and religious sentiments, native to the soul and
never permanently repressible, must rise in resentful protest against
it. The inevitable results of its prevalence must become so repug-
nant and shocking, even to such as are whelmed in the frenzy of
the hour, as speedily to work its own cure. The battle of Chris-
tianity is not with dogmatic atheism.
3, Negations of Atheism. — Primarily and directly, atheism is the
negation of God. Of all negations, this in itself is extreme of
the greatest that the human mind can think or utter. negations.
It cannot remain alone, but must carry with it many others,
and others of profound moment. Atheism is a system of nega-
tions. The negation of the divine existence is the negation of
all Christian truth. If there is no God, there can be no Son
of God ; and, hence, no incarnation, no atonement, no salvation.
There can be no spiritual existence. Matter must be all. There
is no mind in nature, no intelligence that planned the earth and
the heavens, and no omnipotent will that set them in order, or that
preserves their harmonies. There are no intuitions nor absolute
truths ; for atheism is as thorough a negation of our reason as of
our God. There can be no spontaneity or freedom of mind. There
is no mind. Mental phenomena are a mere physical process deter-
mined by mechanical force. There can be no moral obligation or
responsibility. Morality is no duty. Whatever expediency may
urge in behalf of secular interests, without God there can be no
112 SYSTEMATIC THKOLOGY.
ground of moral duty. There is no future existence. Death is the
oblivion of man just as it is the oblivion of a beast.
3. Dialectic Impotence of Atheism.. — In the issue with atheism
the affirmative is with theism. Atheism should regard this fact
with favor, especially for the reason of its inevitable impotence for
any direct support of its own position.
Atheism cannot reply to the proofs of theism. Its impotence lies
in its own i)hilosophv, or, rather, in its utter negation
NO RKPLY TO ^ a • i p • • i
THEisTic of philosophy. Atheism grounds itself in sensational-
PROOFS. -gj^^^ Sensationalism is really no philosophy. It re-
pudiates all the deeper jirinciples which must underlie a philosophy,
all the intuitions of the reason which are necessary to the construc-
tion of a philosophy. The bald and skeptical sensationalism of
atheism furnishes no principles ujion which it can reply to the
proofs of theism — proofs which are grounded in a true and deep
philosophy. If atheism possessed equal logical data with theism
it could only balance proof with disproof, with the result of skepti-
cism, not atheism. It possesses no such data. A denial of the
principle of causation is no answer to the theistic argument so
strongly builded upon that most certain principle. The denial of
a teleological agency in the adaptations of nature is no answer to
the argument from design, since such agency renders the only ra-
tional account of these adaptations, just as the teleological agency
of mind is the only rational account of the facts of human civiliza-
tion. The denial of a moral nature in man is no answer to the
argument constructed upon that ground, so long as t]ie moral
consciousness of the race affirms its realit}^ The shallow sensa-
tionalism of atheism must deny the higher faculties of our ra-
tional intelligence, and the atheist is thereby rendered helpless
against the proofs of theism, just as a blind man is helpless for any
contention against the perceptions of vision.
The negation of a God is not the annihilation of the universe.
The earth and the heavens are still realities of exist-
NO ACCOUNT A 1 •
OF THK COS- ence, worlds of order and beauty. Atheism can give
"*'^' no rational account of these things. After ages of
effort, and with all the resources of science and philosophy at com-
mand, it utterly fails. Xo real advance lias been made since Democ-
ritus and Epicurus theorized about the tumultuous atoms at last tum-
bling into orderly forms. The notions of an eternal series of systems
like the present, or of an accidental concursus of discrete elements
into cosmical forms, or of physical forces eternally latent in matter
and the source of evolutions in time have no scientific warrant, and
make no answer to the logical demand of the facts concerned.
ATHEISM. 113
Most of all is the dialectic impotence of the atheist manifest in
his utter inability to brinff any support to his own po-
. . , , . -l NO DIRECT
sition. All such endeavor is rendered utterly fruitless proof of
by the nescience of his own philosophy. His sensa- ^'^"'^'^'"•
tionalism denies him all the higher forms of knowledge, and all
the principles which must underlie such knowledge. He can know
only the facts given in sensation, and may easily doubt thpir real-
ity. Now, with such narrow limits of knowledge, and such uncer-
tainty of any true knowledge, how can the atheist know that
there is no God, or disprove his existence ? It is only on an as-
sumption of knowledge infinitely transcending all human attain-
ment that he can deny the existence of God. " The wonder then
turns on the great process, by which a man could grow yj^^ q^ jo„[^
to the immense intelligence that can know that there foster.
is no God. What ages and what lights are requisite for this attain-
ment ! This intelligence involves the very attributes of Divinity,
while a God is denied. For unless this man is omnipresent, unless
he is at this moment in every place in the universe, he cannot know
but there may be in some place manifestations of a Deity, by which
even he would be overpowered. If he does not know absolutely
every agent in the universe, the one that he does not know may be
God. If he is not himself the chief agent in the universe, and does
not know what is so, that which is so may be God. If he is not in
absolute possession of all the propositions that constitute universal
truth, the one which he wants may be that there is a God. If
he cannot with certainty assign the cause of all that he perceives to
exist, that cause may be a God. If he does not know every thing
that has been done in the immeasurable ages that are past, some
things may have been done by a God. Thus, unless he knows all
things, that is, precludes another Deity by being one himself, he
cannot know that the Being whose existence he rejects does not
exist. But he must I'now that he does not exist, else he deserves
equal contempt and compassion for the temerity with which he
firmly avows his rejection and acts accordingly."^
II. Pantheism.
1. Doctrinal Statement of Pantheism. — A history of pantheism
would be necessary to the presentation of all its phases, variations op
Variations of the theory seem very natural, we might panthkism.
say inevitable, in view of the wide place it has occupied in both
' John Foster : Essays, essay i, letter v.
References : Buchanan : Modern Atheism, chap, i ; Flint : Antitheistic The-
ories, lect. i ; Pearson : On Infidelity, pp. 6-21.
9
S P I N O / A N
PANTHEISM.
114 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
time and territory. It flourished in Hindu philosophy long before
the Christian era, and also in the earlier Greek philosophy, partic-
ularly in the Elcatic school. It appears in the Christian thought
of the Middle Ages, in the speculations of the scholastics, and more
fully in German philosophy. It was indeed inevitable that minds
so widely separated, and of such variant speculative tendencies,
should construct the doctrine in different forms. The outcome ap-
pears in some radical variations. There is a materialistic pantheism
— so called — in which matter is all ; and life and thought are forces
of matter developed through its organizations. In this view mat-
ter is God, and life and thought are modes of his operation. There
is an ideal pantheism, according to which God and the universe are
merely mental creations. This theory logically leads to absolute
egoism. Such mental creation must be the work of each individual
mind, and each should account all others its own mental produc-
tion, and then assert for itself the sum of existence. What then is
God?
Spinoza, of the seventeenth century, is the representative of
modern pantheism. He treated tlie subject in a philo-
sophic manner never before attempted, and wrought
it into a more exact and definite form than it had ever received.
" Assuming the monistic doctrine, he laid down the proposition
that the one and simjile substance is known to us through the two
attributes of infinite thought and infinite extension. Neither of
these attributes implies personality, the essential elements of which
are denied to the substance. The latter is self-operative, according
to an inward necessity, without choice or reference to ends. All
finite existences, whetlier material or mental, are merely phenom-
enal."' This brief passage leads us to the central facts of the
Spinozan pantheism. The facts, however, are simply placed side
by side ; not skillfully articulated ; not scientifically combined.
Thought is an act of personal mind, not an attribute of being ; and
the denial of personality to the being denies the possibility of the
infinite thought. Extension is a spatial quality and must have a
ground in spatially extended being. It thus appears that the two
attributes are not coherent. Nor do the attributes seem integral to
the one substance, but rather to hang loosely from it, and to give
no expression of cither its reality or nature. Indeed, the one sub-
stance and the two attributes are pure assumptions of the theory.
We may easily give the central and determining facts of the doc-
trine in its more exact form. Pantheism is rigidly monistic in prin-
ciple. There is one substance or being. This principle is so fun-
' Fisher : Essays, pp. 549, 550.
PANTHEISM. 115
damental that materialistic pantheism must speculatively transform
matter into a sense of oneness, or fail to be pantheism, ^j^^^,^ ^p ^^p.
The one substance is without intelligence, sensibility doctrine.
or will, consciousness or personality. The one substance is blindly
operative from an inward necessity. There is neither creation nor
providence. In these facts pantheism is thoroughly antitheistic.
The purely phenomenal character of all manifestations, whether in
material, organic, or mental forms, is determined by the monistic
principle of pantheism. The one substance is neither divisible nor
creative, so that it can neither part with any thing nor produce any
thing to constitute real being in any form of finite existence. All
finite things, therefore, are mere modes of the one infinite substance,
and have a merely phenomenal existence.
2. Monistic Ground of Pantheism. — The mind by a native tend-
ency seeks to combine the manifold into classes, and even into
unity. This is a fortunate tendency, and the beneficial results of
its incitement appear in science and philosophy. But the mental
process in such work has its imperative laws which must be ob-
served ; for, otherwise, instead of any valid result, we have mere
hypothesis or assumption. This is the error of pantheism. Mo-
nism is not a truth of the reason : nor is it inductively
reached and verified through a proper use of the rela- sumed, not
tive facts. As we have elsewhere shown, the phys- '''^^^^°-
ical and mental facts known to us in experience and consciousness
absolutely require distinct and opposite forms of being as their
ground. Nor can matter and mind both be modes of the monistic
ground which pantheism alleges. Both may be the creation of the
one omnipotent personal being ; but a mere nature, without per-
sonality and operative through a blind necessity, cannot manifest
itself in such contradictory modes. The monistic ground of pan-
theism can no more account for the two classes of physical and
mental facts than the material atoms of Democritus. Further,
such a ground of the cosmos, a mere natura naturans, is disproved
by the arguments adduced in proof of theism. The monistic
ground of pantheism is a pure assumption, and an assumption con-
tradicted by the facts of nature.
The utter erroneousness of pantheism is manifest in this, that
the monism which it maintains determines all finite ex- ^ttter erro-
istences to be mere modes of the one infinite substance, neocsness.
mere phenomena withoiit any reality of being in themselves. The
physical universe becomes as unsubstantial as in the extremest form
of idealism. Mind becomes equally unreal. ^N'either can be thus
dismissed from the realm of substantial existence. In the physical
110 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
universe there is very real being. Not all is mere appearance.
And every personal mind has in its own consciousness the absolute
proof of real being in itself. Personal mind is not a mere phenom-
enon. The monism of pantheism is utterly false in doctrine.
3. Relation of Pantheism to Morality and Religion. — It is mostly
admitted that pantheism is something more for the re-
I.ITTLE BETTKR . ■' ...
THAN ATHK- liglous natuTC of man than atheism. We think this
"'''*'■ the case only with some minds. Pantheism is as really
blank of all objective truth which can minister to the religious
cravings of the soul as atheism itself ; and only the devout whose
religious fervor clothes God with many perfections which this doc-
trine denies him — only such souls can find spiritual nourishment
in their conception of him. But so far they replace pantheism
with theism. With most minds pantheism must be as really without
God as atheism itself — just as it is in fact. There is no personal-
ity of God, no divine majesty for the soul's reverence, no love for
the inspiration of its own adoring love, no providence over us, no
place for prayer, no knowledge of us, no heart of sympathy Avith
us, no hand to help us, no Father in heaven. There can be no re-
ligious helpfulness in the idea of a being so utterly blank of all that
the soul craves in God.
In the doctrine of pantheism man is nothing in himself, a phenom-
enon only, a mere mode of the infinite, appearing for a
MODE OF THE whllc, and then vanishing forever. But such totality of
iNFiNiTK. Q^j j^^^i nothingness of man arc utterly exclusive of both
morality and religion. Nothing in us called religion or irreligion,
morality or immorality, is from any agency of our own. All is the
operation of the infinite which manifests itself in such modes.
'' One essential and constituent element of pantheism is the sup-
pressing of all particular causes, and the concentrating of all cau-
sality in a single being ; that is, in God. This arises from another
element of pantheism, yet more essential, which consists in suppress-
ing all particular beings, and concentrating all existence in one sole
being, which is God. If there is but one substance, there is but
one cause ; for without substance there can be only phenomena ;
and phenomena can only transmit action ; they cannot produce it.
Pantheism, laying down the principle, therefore, that there can be
only one being and one cause, and that the universe is only a vast
phenomenon, necessarily concentrates in God all liberty, even if it
attributes liberty to him, and necessarily denies it every -where else.
Man and all other beings, therefore, lose their quality of heing and
of cause, and become only attributes and acts of the divine sub-
stance and cause. Deprived thus of all proper causality, man is
PANTHEISM. 117
also deprived, at the same time, of all liberty, and, consequently,
can have neither a law of obligation nor a controlling power over
his own conduct. Such are the evident and necessary consequences
of pantheism; and the pantheist, who does not adopt them either
does not comprehend his own opinions or is voluntarily false to
them.^'^
If God is not thus all, then he must be an utter blank. Pan-
theism must hold the one side or the other. The tend- ^p atheistic
ency is toward the blankness, which is not other than tkndency.
atheism. " In conceiving of God, the choice before a pantheist
lies between alternatives from which no genius has as yet devised a
real escape. God, the pantheist must assert, is literally every thing;
God is the whole material and spiritual universe; he is humanity
in all its manifestations; he is by inclusion every moral and immoral
agent; and every form and exaggeration of moral evil, no less than
every variety of moral excellence and beauty, is part of the all-
pervading, all-comprehending movement of his universal life. If
this revolting blasphemy be declined, then the God of pantheism
must be the barest abstraction of abstract being; he must, as with
the Alexandrian thinkers, be so exaggerated an abstraction as to
transcend existence itself; he must be conceived of as utterly un-
real, lifeless, non-existent; while the only real beings are these
finite and determinate forms of existence whereof ' nature ' is com-
posed. This dilemma haunts all the historical transformations of
pantheism, in Europe as in the East, to-day as two thousand years
ago. Pantheism must either assert that its God is the one only ex-
isting being whose existence absorbs and is identified with the uni-
verse and humanity; or else it must admit that he is the rarest and
most unreal of conceivable abstractions; in plain terms, that he is
no being at all." ^ Whichever alternative is taken, all grounds of
morality and religion disappear. When pantheism is divested of
all false coloring and set in the light of its own principles it is seen
to be much at one with atheism.^
III. Positivism.
1. TJie Positive Philosophy. — Positivism, considered as a philoso-
phy, is much newer in its name than in its determining principles.
' Jouffroy : Introduction to Ethics, vol. i, p. 193.
' Liddon : Bamx)ton Lectures, 1868, lect. viii.
' Saisset : Modern Pantheism. ; Plnmptre : History of Pantheism ; Hunt : Es-
say on Pantheism ; Buchanan : Modern Atheism, chap, iii ; Jouffroy : Introduc-
tion to Ethics, lects. vi, vii ; Flint : Antitheistic Theories, lects. ix, x ; Thomp-
son : Christian Theism, book i, chap. vi.
118 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
The term came into this use with the system of M. Comte, in the
earlier part of this century.' This use of the term positive has
been sharply criticised; with which fact, however, we are here little
concerned. The meaning could not be simply an affirmative sys-
tem in distinction from negative systems. There was no place for
any sucii distinction. The real meaning of M. Comte seems to be
that his system dealt only with facts certainly known, while oppos-
ing systenis admitted many delusions.
The system of Comte is a most pretentious one. " The posi-
tivism which he taught, taken as a whole, is at once a
PRETKNSIONS .
OF posiTiv- philosophy, a polity, and a religion. It professes to sys-
"'^'' tematize all scientific knowledge, to organize all indus-
trial and social activities, and to satisfy all spiritual aspirations and
affeccions. It undertakes to explain the past, to exhibit the good
and evil, strength and weakness, of the present, and to forecast
the future; to assign to every science, every large scientific gener-
alization, every principle and function of human nature, and every
great social force its appropriate place; to construct a system of
thought inclusive of all well-established truths, and to delineate a
scheme of political and religious life in which duty and happiness,
order and progress, opinion and emotion, will be reconciled and
caused to work together for the good alike of the individual and
of society. " '''
What then are the facts with which M. Comte deals, which may
be so certainly known as to preclude all mistake, and
NARROWNKSS '' . ^ . , . „
OF THE SYS- with which so mighty a structure is to be builded ?
^^"" With such high pretension one might reasonably ex-
pect the fullest recognition of all the powers and resources of the
mind, not only in observation and experience, but equally in the
profoundest intuitions of the reason. Indeed, the vicAV is very nar-
row. The only facts to be known and used are facts of phenomena.
Even here there is a narrow restriction. All facts of consciousness
are excluded. Only external phenomena, only facts outward to the
senses, are admitted into the circle of positivist verities. Nor are
these facts to be known in either ground or cause. For positivism
they have neither ground nor cause. They are simply sensible
facts, or facts of change, to be observed and known in the order of
their succession, and in their likeness or unlikeness.
Positivism is an extreme phenomenalism, and must have its
MEREPHENOM- psycliologlcal ground in a narrow form of sensational-
ENALisM. ism. AYe know that Comte utterly repudiated psychol-
ogy, and no doubt would have resented any suggestion of such a
' Philosophie Positive. ' Flint : Antitheistic Theories, pp. 178, 179.
POSITIVISM. 119
ground of his philosophy. This could not have changed the facts
in the case. A phenomenon means, not only something to appear,
but also a mind to which it appears — a fact which Professor Bowne
has pointed out with special force. External things make no ap-
pearance to our sense-organs. These outward facts of change can
have no phenomenal character until perceived by the mind. How
shall the mind reach them? It has no power of immediate vision;
and there is required, not only the mediation of the sense-organs,
but also the sensations resulting from the impression of external
things. The mind must be conscious of these sensations, or still
there could be no perception of any thing external. Not a single
phenomenon would otherwise be possible. And what would posi-
tivism do without phenomena, since it has nothing else with which
to build its mighty structure? But the sensations necessary to
phenomena are facts of mind, and hence it is utterly futile for the
system to deny for itself a ground in psychology. That the system
is grounded in a purely sensational psychology, and of the very
narrowest type, is manifest in this, that external phenomena are
the only really knowable facts. Even the facts of consciousness
are denied to knowledge. There are no truths of the reason, no
ontological realities. Properties mean nothing for substance;
event=;, nothing for cause. Neither has any reality for knowledge.
Both are excluded by the narrow limitation of knowledge to exter-
nal phenomena. Neither substance nor cause is such a phenom-
enon. If only phenomena can be known, sensations are the only
lights of knowledge. Such sensationalism is not new. It is cer-
tainly as old as the earlier Greek philosophy, and probably has
never since failed of representatives. It has flourished in more
modern times, particularly in the eighteenth century. Positivism
is therefore only a new name for a system which is not new in
the determining principles of its philosophy. No philosophy con-
structed upon the ground of this narrow sensationalism can ever
satisfy the demands of our rational intelligence.
Two things have special prominence in the system of Comte: the
law of the three states, and the classification of the sciences.
The three states are three forms of human thought respecting
the phenomena of nature. In the first state all facts of i,^^ gp the
change are attributed to some supernatural agency: this threk states.
is the theological state. In the second the facts of change are attrib-
uted to the intrinsic forces of nature : this is the metaphysical state,
with the ruling ideas of substance and cause. The third state is the
positivistic, in which the ruling ideas of the first and second are
dismissed, and science deals only with the phenomena of nature.
120 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
Here no account is given of the origin and course of nature. The
question is excluded as delusive and unscientific. For positivism
there is no reality of nature back of phenomena. Nothing has any
account in causation. The law of the three states means that the
human mind passes successively through the three, or through the
first two into the third, beyond which it cannot advance. This
then is the doctrine of the three states. The mind's first ideas are
in the theological state; then in the metaphysical state; and finally
in the scientific or positivistic state. This is the uniform and
necessary law of mental movement, for both the individual and the
race. It is a part of the doctrine that each state is exclusive of the
others, so that the mind must leave the first in order to enter the
second, and the second in order to reach the third.
FACTS nis- '
PROVE THIS The facts in the case do not warrant any such law. It
'''*^' is neither true of the individual mind nor of the race.
The ideas of the child respecting the things about it are far more
positivistic than either metajihysical or theological. The ideas of
the barbarian mind are a mixture of theology and positivism — in
open contradiction to this law of the three states. A higher men-
tal development may eliminate many superstitions assigned to the
theological state, and discover in the forces of nature the causes of
many events previously accounted to supernatural agency; but there
is no necessary parting with either theology or metaphysics on the
most thorough entrance into the sphere of science. The proof of
this statement is in the fact that many very eminent scientists are
true believers in God and his providence, in the law of causation,
and in tlie intrinsic forces of nature. Positivism does not dominate
the higher mental development of the times. With all the advance-
ment of science the truths of both religion and metaphysics are
still firmly held.
In tlie classification of the sciences the ruling principle is, to
begin with the least complex, to proceed in the order
TioN OK THK of increasing complexity, and so ending with the most
.sciKNCKs. complex. The sciences, as given in this order, are
mathematics, astronomy, physics, chemistry, biology, sociology. As
this philosophy admits into its service only facts of external phe-
nomena, it is compelled so to characterize the facts of mathematics.
This is a dire necessity. In none of its principles or processes has
mathematics any such quality. There is nothing outward for the
organic eye; all is for the inner eye of the mind. And, on its rul-
ing principle of classification, how can this philosophy begin with
mathematics as the more simple, and then proceed to astronomy as
more complex, when the very complexity of astronomy arises from
POSITIVISM. 121
the profound problems of mathematics which are its necessary
ground? Then biology is made to include the whole man, just as
it includes the animal and the plant. The mind has no distinct
place in this grand hierarchy of the sciences. It cannot have any
in a system which repudiates all the inner facts of consciousness.
Mind belongs to our physiological constitution and must be studied
in the convolutions of the brain. This is not the way to any true
classification of the sciences. Yet mostly the disciples of Comte
specially admire this part of his work. It has not escaped severe
criticism, even from some who sympathize with many
.' . . . CRITICISM OF
of his views. Spencer and Mill and Huxley are in this t^k classifi-
list. In this criticism there is at times a mingling of *^^'^"^'"*-
contempt. Of course, open inaccuracies in matters of science are
specially glaring and offensive in any one of such lofty pretensions.
M. Comte did a queer thing, and a thing very offensive to most
of his admirers, when he proceeded to construct upon ^ ^p^ RKLUi-
the ground of his positivism a new religion. They ^oa.
naturally thought that in a system so utterly atheistic there was no
place for religion. The offense was the deeper because of the char-
acter of the new religion. Indeed, it is a very queer affair. There
are ceremonies and sacraments, a priesthood and a supreme pontiff.
Collective humanity, symbolized by a woman, is the enthroned
idol. Society must be absolutely subject to the new social and re-
ligious regime. No individual liberty nor rights of conscience can
be tolerated. No wonder that the new religion gave niTTERLy
great offense. Huxley bitterly styles it " Catholicism criticised.
minus Christianity." It could not be so much the absence of
Christianity as the Romish cast of this religion that so deeply of-
fended Mr. Huxley. Mill joins in this severity of criticism; hardly,
however, because this new religion was purposely constructed
"'sans Dieu," since he ventures for himself the opinion that a re-
ligion is possible without a God, and such a religion as may be, even
to Christians, an instructive and profitable subject of contempla-
tion. M. Comte sharply resented these criticisms, and denounced
his followers who accepted his philosophy, but rejected his religion,
as deficient in brains. It is a quarrel in which we have little con-
cern. The new religion is enshrined in — ink. Its devotees are
yery few.
2. 77i-e PMIosopJiT/ Antitheistic. — The heading of this para-
graph might suffice for all the necessary content. Positivism is
openly and avowedly antitheistic. It was purposely constructed
witliout God. In the low plane of its principles there is no need
of God, and no proof of his existence. If knowledge is limited to
122 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
external iDlienomena, there can be no knowledge of God, for he is not
such a phenomenon. We can readily believe La Place
iNTRi.\sicAu.Y that, on surveyiiig the heavens with a telescopo, ho saw
ATHKisTif. j^^ Q^^^j_ j^^ could thus discover only physical phe-
nomena, and God is not such a lihenomenon. It is on such ground
that for positivism he can have no existence. If there is no truth
in either efficient or final causation, nothing in nature leads up to
God. Positivism is thus determined to an antitheistic position by
the low form of its phenomenalism. Its weakness as against theism
arises from this low plane of its philosophy. A position which can
be held only by a limitation of knowledge to external phenomena,
and a virtual denial of our rational intelligence, cannot be strongly
held. That intelligence will assert for itself a much larger sphere.
Nor will reason, with its absolute truths, and conscience, with its
sense of God and duty, vacate their rightful place in our conscious-
ness to the occupancy of j)Ositivism. '
3. TJie Kindred Secularism. — Mr, Holyoake is the acknowledged
leader in the propagation of the modern atheistic secularism. His
theories are set forth and advocated in various publications." The
late ]\Ir. Bradlaugh was in the same leadership, but not in full ac-
cord with Mr. Holyoake. The former was a dogmatic and openly
A SKEPTICAL avowcd atliclst; the latter repudiated the term on ac-
ATHEisM. count of the opprobrium associated with it, and as-
sumed merely a skeptical or agnostic position respecting the divine
existence. "^The theory of secularism is a form, not of dogmatic,
but of slceptical, atheism; it is dogmatic only in denying the suffi-
ciency of tlie evidence for the being and perfections of God. It does
not deny, it only does not believe, his existence. There may be a God
notwithstanding; there may even be sufficient evidence of his being,
although some men cannot, or will not, see it. ^ They do not deny
the existence of God, but only assert that they have not sufficient
' Comte : Philosophie Positive, condensed in an English translation by Miss
Martineau ; Politique Positive, translated by English admirers ; Littre : A^l-
guste Comte et la Philosophie Positive ; Congreve : Essays, Political, Social, and
Religious; Bridges: Unity of Comte'' s Life and Doctrines — a reply to Mill;
Lewes : History of Philosojihy, vol. ii, pp. 590-639 ; Morley : Encyclopcedia
Britannica, art. " Comte ;" Spencer : Genesis of Science; Classification of the
Sciences ; Mill : Auguste Comte and Positivism, ; Huxley : Lay Serynons, vii,
viii ; McCosh : Christianity and Positimsm ; Flint : Antitheistic Theories,
lect. V ; Martineau : Essays, vol. i, pp. 1-62 ; Morell : Histoi'y of Modem
Philosophy, pp. 354-362.
^ Paley Refuted; Trial of Theism; Toivnly and Holyoake ; Grant a7id Hol-
yoake, and other public debates ; The Reasoncr, a periodical edited by Mr. Hol-
yoake, and the chief organ of the modern Freethinkers of England.
POSITIVISM. 123
proof of his existence/ ' ' The non-theist takes this ground. He
affirms that natural reason has not yet attained to (evidence of)
Supernatural Being, He does not deny that it may do so, because
the capacity of natural reason in the pursuit of evidence of Super-
natural Being is not, so far as he is aware, fixed. ^ ' The power of
reason is yet a growth. To deny its power absolutely would be
hazardous; and in the case of a speculative question, not to admit
that the opposite views may in some sense be tenable is to assume
your own infallibility, a piece of arrogance the public always pun-
ish by disbelieving you when you are in the right.^^ Accordingly,
the thesis which Mr. Holyoake undertook to maintain in public
discussion was couched in these terms: 'That we have not sufficient
evidence to believe in the existence of a Supreme Being independ-
ent of Nature,' and so far from venturing to deny his existence,
he makes the important admission that ' denying implies infinite
knotvledge as the ground of disproof.'" ^
Secularism is the practical application of positivism to the con-
duct of the present life. While less jironounced in its
atheism, it equally denies all present knowledge of God, appucation
and all sufficient proof of his existence. If there is no "f" posmv-
ISM.
God, there is no future existence ; certainly no proof of
such an existence. The present world and the interests of the
present life we know. Therefore we should wholly dismiss from
our thought and care both God and religion, and give our whole
attention to the interests of the present life. A divine providence
must be substituted by the providence of science. A practical
atheism should thus rule the present life.
This secularism must be more thoroughly atheistic at heart than
in open profession, for otherwise it could not thus en- rkally athe-
force the lesson of practical atheism. It often occurs '^tic.
in our seculiar interests that prudence imperatively demands at-
tention to the slightest chance of certain contingencies. How
much more should this be the case respecting interests which may
stretch away into eternity! Secularism admits that there may be a
God and a future life; that it is impossible to prove or know the
contrary. It is a principle admitted by all thoughtful minds that
questions of interest should receive attention according to their im-
portance. Then, with the admissions of secularism respecting the
divine existence and a future life, it opposes itself to all the dic-
tates of prudence, and is utterly without rational warrant. It
takes this position against the common faith of the race in the
^ The Reasoner, xii, pp. 24, 376. - Ibid., New Series, jjp. 9, 130.
^ Buchanan : Modem Atheism, p. 365.
124 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
existence and providence of a divine being, and the future existence
of man; against the universality of religion, and against its neces-
sity as arising from the constitution of the mind, which, with rare
exceptions, is now admitted by all students of the question; against
the conclusion of the profound thinkers of the ages that in the
works of nature and the endowments of mind there are conclusive
proofs of the existence of God.
Secularism is not content to be merely a theory; it becomes a
propaganda. That from such merely skeptical ground
any one should draw for himself the lessons of prac-
tical atheism is unreasonable enough. That he should feel im-
pelled to a propagandism for the purpose of indoctrinating the
masses into a life without God, or religious duty, or thought of a
future state leads us again to an atheism, far deeper at heart than
in the open profession, as the only account of such a propagandism.
Its method is most skillful. So much must be conceded to secular-
ism. Dogmatic atheism is not winsome. A merely skeptical athe-
ism, quite concealed in the appeals to secular interests, encounters
far less opposition in the common moral consciousness. Then the
propagation is attempted among the masses, the men of toil whose
secular lot is often a hard one. Secularism is not for men of afflu-
ence. Little need is there for preaching to such the paramount
duty of exclusive attention to the interests of the present life. The
common toilers suffer many privations, and, with open professions
of sympathy and a 2:)urpose of helping them, it is not difficult to
get their attention. Advantage is easily taken of the state of
unrest or discontent with the laboring class, and their prejudices
turned to practical account in favor of secularism.
The improvement of the condition of the laboring classes is a
ONLY EVIL FOR wortliy aim. Whether secularism has any such honest
THE PEOPLE, g^ij^ ig uncertain. Its leaders may think so, and yet be
self-deceived. An unsuspected depth of atheism and intensity of
prejudice against Christianity may rule them in a measure un-
known to themselves. No unperverted mind can think tliat the
secularism which they preach can improve the temporal condition
of the laboring masses. It is not secularity tliat they need. Mostly
this is already dominant. The need is for its wise direction. Such
direction can never come from an atheistic secularism. 1'he deep-
est need is for higher ideas of life; iDre-eminently for moral and re-
ligious ideas. These ideas are the best practical forces for even
the present life. They nourish higher aims and purposes, preserve
from vice and waste, inspire industry and economy, patience and
hope. Atheism utterly blanks these ideas, opens the flood-gates of
POSITIVISM. 125
vice and waste, and breeds discontent and despair. It is a shallow
assumption of this atheistic secularism that religion, even that
Christianity is a detriment to the present life — an assumption ut-
terly irrational on the face of it, and utterly disproved by the facts
of history.'
IV. Naturalistic EvoLUTioisr.
1. Theory of Evolution. — The theory of evolution has become so
familiar, even to the popular mind, that for our own discussion it
needs no very exact statement. The theory involves two questions:
one, a question of fact respecting the origin of species in the mode
of evolution; the other, respecting the law of the process, or the
force or forces which determine the evolution. Respecting these
forces there are among evolutionists marked differences of opinion;
with which, however, we are not here concerned.
Eespecting the question of fact, the theory is that species arise in
the mode of evolution, the higher being evolved out of j^ojjj. ^y j-^q.
the lower. The process is from a beginning up to man, lution.
The ascension is either in the mode of slight, insensible variation
and improvement, as maintained by Darwin, or by leaps, as others
hold. In one or the other mode, or in both, higher species are
held to have been successively evolved from the lower. Thus from
some incipient form or forms of life, and through successive evolu-
tions into higher organic orders, the human species has been
reached. Man is the last and the highest result of the process.
Whether he is the highest possible evolution, the theory does not
inform us. On the principles of the theory, there is no reason
why the process should terminate with man, unless the evolving
forces are already exhausted. If these forces are purely and ex-
clusively natural, they can possess only a finite potency, and must
therefore reach a point of elevation above which they cannot ascend.
The evolution of an order as high above man as man is above mol-
lusk would be a grand result. Mere naturalistic evolution can
hardly promise so much.
Naturalistic evolution requires a preparation in the inorganic
world for the inception and development of the organic, process of
It is admitted that life could not exist in the primor- preparation.
dial state of matter as known to science. Only through a long
process of change could the necessary conditions be provided for
the origin and progress of life. The nebular cosmogony covers
much of this preparation, and is really a part of the theory of nat-
' Buchanan : Modern Atheism, chap, ix ; Flint: Antithcistic Theories, lect.
vi ; Pearson : On Infidelity, Appendix.
TIIKORV.
126 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
uralistic evolution. We previously explained that theory of world-
building. In the beginning all matter existed in a state of intensest
heat, in the form of a fire-mist. By the oj^eration of natural forces
a process of change began therein, and has continued without in-
terruption through the formation of the world, the origin of life,
and the evolution of species. Thus the inception of change in the
primordial fire-mist was theoretically the real beginning of this
form of evolution.
2. Distinction of Tlieistlc and Naturalistic Evolution. — The-
istic evolution means a divine agency in the process. There are
differences of opinion respecting the measure of this
THKisTic agency. Some jDosit special interpositions, as in the
origin of life and in the origin of mind. Others hold
the nebular cosmogony and the evolution of species, not as a pro-
cess carried on by the forces of nature, but as the method of the
divine agency in creation. In the view of such the divine agency
is just as real in the origin of a new species as it would be in its
original or immediate creation. Such theories might modify the
proofs of the divine existence, but could not void nor even weaken
their force. Some would claim an enhancement of their cogency.
Even Darwin's narrow limitation of the divine agency to an incip-
ient vitalization of a few simple forms leaves the ground of theistic
proofs in its full strength. In the light of reason, tliat agency
which could endow a few simple organic forms with potencies for
the evolution of all living orders is possible only in a personal be-
ing of infinite wisdom and power. The view is false to the divine
providence, and to the true sense of creation, but leaves the cosmo-
logical, the teleological, and the moral arguments in their full
strength.
The theory of a purely naturalistic evolution is in the nature of
ANTiTHKisTic 1^ autitheistlc. It allows no divine agency at any point
THEORY. in the whole process, and asserts an absolute continuity
of the physical forces which initiated the movement in the primor-
dial fire-mist. Such a theory cannot be other than antitheistic.
No repudiation of materialism or atheism, or of both,
can change this fact. Instances of such repudiation are
OF MATKRIAI,-
isM AND ATHE- jjq^ wautiug; but they mean little or nothing contrary
to either materialism or atheism. Materialism is de-
nied under the cover of a new definition of matter Avhich classifies
the phenomena of mind with the phenomena of matter. The re-
sult is not the elevation of the latter to a spiritual ground, but the
reduction of the former to a material ground. The mental facts
are thoroughly merged into the physical process, under an absolute
NATURALISTIC EVOLUTION. 127
continuity of force. There is no escape from materialism in this
mode. Sometimes the denial of materialism means simj)ly a denial
of the reality of matter^ or means onr utter ignorance of any such
reality. After a long discussion of "■ the physical basis of life,"
thoroughly materialistic in its process and outcome, even to the in-
clusion of all mental facts, Huxley says: "I, individually, am no
materialist, but, on the contrary, believe materialism to involve
grave philosophical error.'" ' That we correctly stated the ground
of this denial appears in his words which follow: "For, after all,
what do we know of this terrible '^ matter,' excej^t as a name for
the unknown and hypothetical cause of states of our own conscious-
ness? And what do wo know of that 'spirit' over whose threat-
ened extinction by matter a great lamentation is arising, like that
which was heard at the death of Pan, except that it also is a name
for an unknown and hypothetical cause, or condition, of states of
consciousness? In other words, matter and spirit are but names
for the imaginary substrata of groups of natural phenomena. " '^
This is pure phenomenalism, and, instead of an ascent to the spir-
ituality of mind, is a descent to the lowest level of the Comtian
positivism. This level is most thoroughly antitheistic. The denial
of atheism often means a nescience of God rather than any faith
in his existence. This is certainly the case with some evolutionists
who confess to many mysteries of nature which have no solution in
any empirical mode. " They have as little fellowship with the
atheist who says there is no God as with the theist who j)i'ofesses
to know the mind of God."^ Such a separation from atheism
means no acceptance of theism.
Much of the modern antitheism allies itself with the theory of
naturalistic evolution. The theory itself is thoroughlv
. . •' O J CHIEF ALLI-
antitheistic. We must not here overlook the distinc- ance ok anti-
tion of this theory from the theistic theory. The facts ™^'^*'-
upon which the theory is professedly constructed are not in the
line of our studies, and hence we have no prej)aration for its scien-
tific discussion. Yet some questions which deeply concern the
theory are oiDen to fairly intelligent minds. Such we may briefly
consider.
3. Perplexities of the Naturalistic Theory. — As we have seen,
this theory begins with the nebular cosmogony. Its only material
is the primordial fire-mist; its only agencies, the physical forces
latent therein. With such material, and through the operation of
such forces, it must build the world and originate all the forms of
' Lay Sermons, p. 139. - Ibid., p. 143.
^ Tyndall ; Fragments of Science, p. 457.
128 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
life, including man himself. The results are before us. Such are
the assumptions of the theory. Surely they are ex-
travagant enough to perplex the shrewdest and appall
the boldest. In the light of reason insuperable difficulties beset
the theory at many points.
What account can the theory give of the primordial fire-mist?
If it be granted that the indices of geology and cos-
NO ACCOUNT ° . . ?
oFTHKKiRK- uiogouy poiut to such a prior state of matter, unan-
*"^^' swered questions still remain. The fire-mist, primordial
with science, is not primordial with reason. Whence the fire-mist?
Reason demands the real beginning, and a sufficient cause for it,
as for every transition in the upward cosmical movement. The
primordial fire-mist makes no answer to these demands. The
hypothesis of evolution gives us no light. " It does not solve — it
does not profess to solve — the ultimate mystery of this universe.
It leaves, in fact, that mystery untouched. For, granting the neb-
ula and its potential life, the question, whence they came, would
still remain to baffle and bewilder us. At bottom, the hypothesis
does nothing more than ' transport the conception of life's origin
to an indefinitely distant past.'''' The granting a potential life
in the fire-mist is a pure gratuity, without any ground or proof in
empirical science. The hypothesis of evolution, with its beginning
in the nebular cosmogony, is, for any rationale of the cosmos, con-
fessedly an utter blank.
No theory could be in profounder need of the most certain and
most certainlv verifying facts than this of naturalistic
VERIFYING evolution. On the face of it the theory is most irra-
KACTs. tional. As previously stated, there is for a beginning
only the nebula or fire-mist. Through the operation of physical
forces this fire-mist goes to work, forms itself into worlds and sets
them in the harmony of the heavens, just as if directed by an om-
niscient mind. For our own world, as probably for many others,
it provides the conditions suited to living beings, originates life in
the many forms which swim in tho waters, fly in the air, roam in
forest and field. A wonderful ascent is this, but a mere starting
compared with the culmination. In the process of evolutiau this
fire-mist mounts to the grade of man and invests itself with the
high powers of personality. Now it legislates in the wisdom of
Moses, sings in the psalmody of David, reasons in the philosophy of
Plato, frames the heavens in tho science of Newton, preaches in the
power of Paul, and crowns all human life and achievement with the
divine life of the Christ. All this is in the assumption of natural-
' Tyndall : Fragments of Science, p. 455.
NATURALISTIC EVOLUTION. 129
istic evolution. " Surely the mere statement of such a notion is
more than a refutation. But the h3^pothesis would probably go
even farther than this. Many who hold it would probably assent
to the position that, at the present moment, all our philosophy, all
our poetry, all our science, and all our art — Plato, Shakespeare,.
Newton, and Eaphael — are potential in the fires of the sun. We
long to learn something of our origin. If the evolution hypothesis be
correct, even this unsatisfied yearning must have come to us across
the ages which separate the unconscious primeval mist from the
consciousness of to-day. I do not think that any holder of the
evolution hypothesis would say that I overstate or overstrain it in
any way. I merely strip it of all vagueness, and bring before you,
unclothed and unvarnished, the notions by which it must stand or
fall. Surely these notions represent an absurdity too monstrous to
be entertained by any sane mind. " ' In this exigency Tyndall
seeks relief in a new definition of matter. His effort is utterly
fruitless, and leaves in all its strength his characterization of the
hypothesis of naturalistic evolution. All this, however, could not
disprove the theory in the j)resence of clearly ascertained facts suf-
ficient for its verification, but it clearly points to an absolute neces-
sity for such facts. Their absence must be fatal to the theory.
The origin of life is a crucial question with this theory. A wide
gulf separates the living from the lifeless. How shall
this gulf be crossed? Can this theory bridge it? It the origin
must, if it would itself live. The bridge must answer o^""fe.
for the crossing. Abiogenesis, the origin of living matter from
lifeless matter, is a necessity of the theory. Hence no mere specu-
lation, conjecture, or illogical inference will answer at this point.
Only the veritable facts will answer. What is the present state of
the question? Comparatively recently, and after re- ^o proof of
viewing the relative facts. Professor Huxley said: abiogenesis.
" The fact is, that at the present moment there is not a shadow of
trustworthy direct evidence that abiogenesis does now take place, or
has taken place within the jDcriod during which the existence of
life on the globe is recorded. " ' There is no better witness to this
state of the case. Huxley is familiar with all the facts concerned,
and has said many things which clearly m.ean that he is a reluctant
witness.
The bent of Huxley's mind is so strongly toward a purely natu-
ralistic evolution that he could not close the case with such a state-
ment. Hence he proceeds: " But it need hardly be pointed out
' Tyndall : Fragments of Science, pp. 453-454.
^ Encyclopcedia Britannica, *' Biology."
10
130 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
that the fact does not in the slightest degree interfere with any
conclusion that may be arrived at deductively from
ASSUMPTION . . *' . J
OF DKDrcTivE otlicr considcrations that, at some time or other, abio-
PROOF. genesis must have taken place." Indeed, we think this
pointing out very urgent, and, moreover, that this abiogenesis must
be proved as a fact, because it is a necessary part of naturalistic
evolution. Without the proof of that fact the theory must utterly
fail. The proof is attempted. How? Thus: *' If the hypothesis of
evolution is true, living matter must have arisen from not-living
matter; for, by the hypothesis, the condition of the globe was at one
time such that living matter could not have existed in it, life being
entirely incompatible with the gaseous state. ... Of the causes
which have led to the origination of living matter, then, it may
be said that we know absolutely nothing. But postulating the ex-
istence of living matter endowed with that power of hereditary
transmission, and with that tendency to vary which is found in all
such matter " — why, then Darwin could show how the process of
evolution went on.
This is jumbling logic, and in a case whex'e exactness is needed.
JUMBLING Its fallacies are easily pointed out. On the hypothesis
LOGIC. of evolution, living matter must have arisen from not-
living matter, because there could have Tjeen no life in the primor-
dial lire-mist. This is the deductive process, suggested in the first
citation, by which abiogenesis is to be proved. But abiogenesis is
not a necessary part of evolution. Evolution might be a process in
nature, while at the beginning life originated in a divine fiat. No
doubt a majority of evolutionists hold this view. Hence abiogen-
esis is necessary only to the purely naturalistic theory of evolution.
It is absolutely necessary to this theory. How, then, is abiogenesis
proved as a fact? From the hypothesis of naturalistic evolution
Huxley deduces the reality of abiogenesis. If the hypothesis be
true, abiogenesis must be true. But this " must be " is merely a
consequence in logic, not a reality in nature. And it is a conse-
quence that hangs upon a mere hypothesis. Here is queer logic.
Abiogenesis is deduced as a fact in nature from evolution as a mere
hypothesis. This is the sheerest fallacy. Then life thus surrepti-
tiously got is postulated as a reality in possession of high endow-
ments: " But postulating the existence of living matter endowed
with that power of hereditary transmission, and with that tendency
to variation which is found in all such matter " — then we may ac-
cept the hypothesis of naturalistic evolution.
Any theory could be proved in this way. It is a short and easy
process. Make your hypothesis; deduce its logical consequence;
NATURALISTIC EVOLUTION. 131
transform this consequence into a reality in nature; make this real-
ity the proof of your hypothesis, and the work is done, ^j^^ theory
This is really the way in which Huxley proves the nat- so protable.
uralistic theory of evolution. By a saltative process of logic he
constructs a science of evolution. The structure tumbles in the
presence of the facts. Abiogenesis is an essential part of natural-
istic evolution, the very ground of the theory, and must be verified
as a fact before the theory can have any standing. The verification
must proceed in an inductive mode, with the support of the neces-
sary facts. But the necessary facts are not at hand. There is not
a shadow of proof in favor of abiogenesis. We know absolutely
nothing about any such origin of life. This is the open confession.
In such a case there is absolutely no proof. Had there been any,
Huxley would certainly not have resorted to such fallacies of logic,
and to a method utterly unscientific. In no other hands could the
theory have fared any better. The warranted concliision is that
naturalistic evolution is utterly groundless. It must remain
groundless until proof is furnished of a material genesis of life.
If naturalistic evolution could prove a material genesis of life, it
might claim an open way up through all organic orders
o i .; 1 O & ^ CONCERNING
— certainly through all below man. In the utter fail- the e v o l u-
ure of this proof, the theory must verify itself in every '^^^^ °^ ^^^'
grade of the assumed evolution. There are openly confessed per-
plexities at many points. However, we leave these questions to
scientists. The proof of evolution up to man could not conclude
his origin in the same mode. He is too distinct in his constitution,
and too high in his grade, for any such conclusion. This view is
widely accepted. Many evolutionists separate man from all lower
orders, and account his origin, particularly in his mental and moral
nature, to the creative agency of God.
In bodily form, in organic, structure, in volume of brain, man is
so widely separated from all other orders, so elevated j,q early ape-
above all, that his immediate evolution from any known ^-i^e man.
order clearly seems impossible. This may be said in the presence
of all the determining principles which underlie the theories of evo-
lution. In the distinctive facts which place man at such a height,
he was the same in his earliest existence that he is now. No dis-
covered remains represent him in the beginning as far down the
scale in approximation to the ape. Mr. Huxley has closely exam-
ined this subject, and with special view to the question of man's
origin in the mode of evolution. In this investigation he critically
studied the notable Engis and Neanderthal skulls, among the very
oldest human fossils yet discovered. His conclusion is that man
132 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
was man then as he is man now. Respecting tlie Engis skull, he
says: " It is, in fact, a fair average human skull, which might have
belonged to a philosopher, or might have contained the thoughtless
brains of a savage." The Neanderthal skull represents a man of
somewhat lower t}^e, but still a man as widely separated from the
ape as the lower races of the present. " In conclusion, I may say
that the fossil remains of man hitherto discovered do not seem to
me to take us appreciably nearer to that lower pithecoid form, by
the modification of which he has probably become what he is."'
Dawson confirms these views, and even adds to their strength by
the study of other fossil remains.' The meaning of all this is that
the wide separation of living man from the ape is not in the least
narrowed by any discovered remains of fossil man.
These facts render the evolution of man simply in his organic
nature a very difficult question for thorough-going evo-
RESPKCTING -' ^ . . ,
MAX'S ORGANIC lutionists. Of coursc, there is no pretension to any
NATURK. knowledge of actual instances of such evolution.
"Where, then, are the proofs? If in the evolution of lower orders
instances could be shown of as wide a variation by a single bound
as that which separates man from the ape, some proof of his evolu-
tion might therein be claimed; but there are no such instances.
Besides, the Darwinian theory excludes the saltatory mode of evo-
lution, and therefore must pronounce such instances an impossi-
bility. The only other resource, if any, is in transitional links.
If some paleontologist should uncover the fossilized remains of an-
thropoids successively ascending from the ape into a higher likeness
to man until the last transition seemed possible, much proof would
be claimed for his evolution. Confessedly, these links are still
missing. Evolutionists are looking in the direction just pointed
out. "Where, then, must we look for primeval man? Was the
oldest liomo sapiens pliocene or miocene, or yet more ancient? In
still older strata do the fossilized bones of an ape more anthropoid,
or a man more pithecoid, than any yet known await the researches
of some unborn paleontologist?" ' That no such discovery has yet
been made is much against all hope of the future. Evolutionists
may continue looking, but they should not meantime claim the
evolution of man just as though the necessary proofs were on hand.
"No remains of fossil man bear evidence to less perfect erect-
ness of structure than in civilized man, or to any nearer approach
to the man-ape in essential characteristics. The existing man-apes
belong to lines that reached up to them as their ultimatum; but
' Huxley : Man^s Place in Nature, pp. 181, 183.
^Nature and the Bible, lect. v. 'Man's Place in Nature, p. 184.
NATURALISTIC EVOLUTION. 133
of that line which is supposed to have reached upward to man, not
the first Hnk below the lowest level of existing man has yet been
found. This is the more extraordinary in view of the fact that,
from the loAvest limits in existing man, there are all possible grada-
tions up to the highest; while below that limit there is an abrupt
fall to the ape-level, in which the cubic capacity of the brain is
one-half less. If the links ever existed, their annihilation without
trace is so extremely improbable that it may be pronounced im-
possible. Until some are found, science cannot assert that they
ever existed."'
Other difficulties than the wide separation of man from all lower
orders beset the theory of his evolution. We should
'' NO APE FAM-
not be misled by all that we hear about the anthropoid ily specially
ape, nor lured into the notion of some one family spe- *'^^■"'^^•
cially man-like. Nor should we admit the notion of an ascending
scale of man-likeness through a succession of ape families until the
higher points of similarity converge in a single family. There is
in these families no such prophecy of the evolution of man. That
the ape families do not in any order of succession represent a growth
of anthropoid quality an eminent scientist clearly points out.^ In
his careful study of the question, Mivart shows that the points of
likeness to man are widely distributed among the ape families, and
in a very miscellaneous way. Thus there is no gathering of anthro-
poid qualities into any one family, and no ascension through the
several families toward a higher man-likeness. " In fact, in the
words of the illustrious Dutch naturalists, Messrs. Shroeder van
der Kolk and Vrolik, the lines of affinity existing between differ-
ent primates construct rather a network than a ladder."' There
can be no ascent toward man through such a state of facts. Hence
the perplexity of evolutionists in locating the parentage of man,
whether in the chimpanzee, or in the gibbon, or in the gorilla,
or in the orang, or in some other ape family. Of later years the
gorilla has been in much favor. Mivart, however, sends him to
the rear and denies him all chance of appropriating the high honor
of fatherhood to mankind. It seems impossible for evolutionists
to construct a ladder out of such a web, so as to gain any ascent
toward man.
Wallace studied this same question, and recognized its perplexi-
ties. " On the whole, then, we find that no one of the testimony of
great apes can be positively asserted to be the nearest Wallace.
to man in structure. Each of them approaches him in certain
' Dana : Geology, 1875, p. 603. '^ Mivart : Man and Apes, part iii.
"-Ibid., pp. 175, 176.
134 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
characteristics, while in others it is widely removed, giving the
idea, so consonant with the theory of evolution as developed by
Darwin, that all are derived from a common ancestor, from which
the existing anthropoid apes as well as man have diverged." ' The
ape-parentage of man is thus abandoned, while an earlier parentage
common to ape and man is assumed. The present tendency of
evolutionists is strongly toward this view. Clearly, the reason for
it arises from the insuperable difficulties which beset the theory of
an ape-parentage of man. How are they less in the new view?
There is no reason to think a remoter ancestor more anthropoid than
the ape. No evidence is given of such a fact. Thus, too, the line
is lengthened, instead of shortened, along which the missing links
must be found, in order to any proof of the evolution of man.
There is really no proof of the evolution of man's organic nature,
Xaturalistic evolution assumes the burden of proving the evolu-
No ACCOUNT ^ion of the whole nature of man. No exception can
OF MIND. be made in respect to his mental and moral nature. A
theory which begins with the fire-mist as its only material, and the
forces latent therein as its only agencies, must proceed to the end
with such equipment. No other essence or agency can be admitted
or assumed at any point in the evolutionary process. The natural-
istic evolution of man's mental nature involves infinitely greater
difficulty than the evolution of his organic nature. This is the
reason for the imperative demand for a new definition of matter.
We already have Tyndall's view of the absurdity of evolution on
the definition current in science since the time of Democritus.
Others join him in the demand for a new definition which shall
thoroughly transform matter. If only they had the power of tran-
substantiation, success might crown their endeavor. However, a
new name does not change an old nature. Matter is still the very
same. Some adopt a Hylozoistic view of nature. Others are forced
into idealism or agnosticism. Matter is nothing substantively, or
a mystical something about which we know nothing. All this
makes full concession that matter as we know it, and as it really is,
cannot be the source of mind, and that the higher nature of man
could not have its origin in naturalistic evolution.
As previously stated, many evolutionists, and some Avho hold the
evolution of the organic nature of man, do not admit the origiji of
his higher faculties in tliis mode. They deny its possibility on the
very principles of evolution. Wallace is an instance, and his view
may have the greater weight because be is a Darwinian, and might
fairly have claimed to share with Darwin t!ie originality of his
' Wallace : Danm'nism, pp. 452, 453.
NATURALISTIC EVOLUTION. 135
theory. But with the conchision of Darwin, '^'that man's entire
nature and all his faculties, whether moral, intellectual,
...IT 1 T ■ 1 £ J.1 • T 4. • WALLACE DIS-
or spiritual, have been derived from their rudiments m provks the
lower animals," he loins issue. We need not follow evolution op
... MIND.
his discussion; but he shows the impossibility of such
an evolution of our higher faculties, such as the mathematical, mu-
sical, artistic, and moral.'
4. JVo Disproof of Theism. — Only in its extreme form is evolu-
tion antitheistic. We have seen that eminent scientists hold the
nebular cosmogony and the evolution of species as a method of the
divine agency in creation, and hence in the fullest accord with
theism. So that the proof of evolution as a process in nature would
not in itself prove any thing against theism. But the theory of
evolution is yet in an hypothetic state. It is not yet an ^^ ut lo n
established science. The diversities of theory among only an hy-
evolutionists deny it a scientific position. There are
many gaps yet to be closed; ^ many facts not yet adjusted to the
theory, and serious deficiencies of direct proof. " Those who hold
the doctrine of evolution are by no means ignorant of the uncer-
tainty of their data, and they only yield to it a j)rovisional assent.
They regard the nebular h3rpothesis as probable, and, in the utter
absence of any evidence to prove the act illegal, they extend the
method of nature from the present into the past."' Evolution
then is an inference from a mere hypothesis. This is not the
method of science. Hypothesis is an utterly insufficient ground
for any science. No theory can claim a scientific position until it
has verified itself by facts.
In some instances there are generalizations from a few observed
facts. Thus from the observed co-existence of certain characteris-
tics in a few animals their invariable co-existence is inferred. This
inference, however, is not in itself a scientific principle, and be-
comes such only on the warrant of the uniformity of nature. But
the theory of evolution has the warrant of no such law. Produc-
tion in kind rules the propagation of life. This is a most certain
generalization. But it is one which gives no support to the theory
of evolution. Indeed, it is in direct opposition to the origin of
species in the mode of evolution.^
Much more is the evolution of man a mere hypothesis. The sci-
' Wallace : Daivjuinism, pp. 461-478.
'^ McCosh : Christianity and Positivism, pp. 343-345.
^ Tyndall : Fragments of Science, p. 456.
^ Winchell : Evolution, p. 54 ; Dawson : Story of the Earth and Man, p. 327 ;
Quatrefages : The Human Species, p. 80.
136 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
entific proof of it is hardly a pretension. It is an inference from
the hypothesis of evohition in the lower forms of life.
PCRKLY HY- - i
poTiiETic KE- We have already seen how Huxley attempted its deduc-
spECTiNG MAN. ^-^^^ from such an hypothesis. It is really in the same
way that Wallace maintains the origin of man's organic nature in
evolution.' It is a very common method. The method, however,
is utterly unscientific. The truth is that the deductive method
is wholly inapplicable to such a science. It is the method of
mathematics and metaphysics, to which evolution is foreign, and
not of the natural sciences, which include evolution. ° The origin
of man in the mode of evolution is without proof. And this resort
to deductive proof, at once utterly unscientific and in open viola-
tion of logical method, is a confession that the theory is without
the facts necessary to its scientific verification. Opposed to such
an unwarranted inference of the evolution of man are the over-
whelming disproofs of such an origin. Surely such a state of facts
can make nothing against the proofs of theism.
If the origin of new species in the mode of evolution were of
present occurrence, and open to the most searching ob-
NATCRALISTIC ^ . ' 1 . . . *
EVOLUTION UN- scrvatlon, a purely naturalistic evolution could neither
PROVABLE. Y)Q known nor proved. A supernatural agency in the
process would not be open to sense-perception, but would be mani-
fest in our reason. This accords with the theory of many evo-
lutionists. Scientific authority is very largely against a purely
naturalistic evolution. This fact means the more because it arises
from scientific or philosophic grounds, not from religious jDredilec-
tion. What is the conclusion ? As evolution is yet in an hypothetic
state; as a purely naturalistic evolution is in the nature of it un-
provable; and as scientists are by a very weighty preponderance
against such a doctrine, there is nothing in the theory which in the
least discredits the proofs of theism.^
' £)aru>ims»u, p. 446. '^ Krauth-Fleming : Vocabulary, "Deduction."
' Darwin : The Onyin of Species ; The Descent of Man ; Professor Gray :
Danviniana ; Haeckel : Histonj of Creation ; Histoi^y of the Evolution of Man ;
Mivart : On the Genesis of iSpeoVs ; Man and Apes ; Lessons from Nature ;
Schmidt : Doctrine of Descent and Darwinism ; Wallace : Contributions to the
Theory of Natural Selection ; Damvinism ; Wilson : Chapters on Evolution ;
Conn : Evolution of To-day ; Hodge : What is Danvinisin f Winchell : Evo-
lution; Joseph Cook: Biology, lects. ii, iii, "Concessions of Evolutionists;"
Dawson : Nature and the Bible, lects. iv-vi ; Story of the Earth and Man,
chaps, xiv, xv ; Quatrefages : The Human Species.
DENIAL OF DIVINE PERSONALITY. 137
CHAPTEE IV.
ANTITHEISTIC AGNOSTICISM.
That form of agnosticism with which we are here concerned
will aj)pear in the discussion. It belongs to pantheism, on the one
hand, and, on the other, has its special representatives in Sir Will-
iam Hamilton and Herbert Spencer.
I. Deistial of Divine Personality.
1. Assumption of Limitation in Personality. — The pantheistic
view is stated as follows: " Personality only exists on pantheistic
condition of a limitation, that is to say, by a negation, ^'ew.
From this it follows that Infinite Being, excluding all negation and
all limit, excludes also all personality. To conceive God as a per-
son, we must attribute to him the forms of human activity,
thought, love, joy, will. But thought supposes variety and succes-
sion of ideas. Love cannot exist without want, nor joy without sad-
ness, nor will without effort, and all this implies limitation, space,
and time. A personal God is therefore limited, mutable, imperfect.
He is a being of the same species as man, more powerful, wiser if
you will, but like him imperfect, and infinitely below an absolute
principle of existence." ^ It will not be overlooked that Saisset has
thus given, not his own doctrine, but that of pantheism — a doctrine
which he treats with a masterly analysis and refutation.
The following passage from Spencer gives the substance of his
doctrine: " Those who espouse this alternative position spencer's
— of an ultimate personal cause — make the erroneous doctrine.
assumj^tion that the choice is between personality and something
lower than personality; whereas the choice is rather between per-
sonality and something higher. Is it not just possible that there is a
mode of being as much transcending intelligence and will as these
transcend mechanical motion ? It is true that we are utterly unable
to conceive any such higher mode of being. But this is not a rea-
son for questioning its existence; it is rather the reverse." ^ What
would Spencer think of a theologian who should so reason about
the Trinity? He has an unquestioning faith in such a "^higher
' Saisset : Modern Pantheism, vol. i, pp. 11, 12.
^ First Principles, p. 109.
138 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
mode of being," but loyalty to his nescience of the Infinite per-
mitted only an hypothetic statement of it. The passage cited,
especially as taken in connection Avith his doctrine of the Absolute,
plainly denies the divine personality as a limitation and imperfec-
tion. In the same connection he declares the ascription of per-
sonal attributes to God a degradation of him. Then follows a
homily upon " the impiety of the pious " who meanly worship God
as a person instead of reverently worshiping the Unknowable Ab-
solute. There is the charitable concession of a contingent good,
an element of truth even within the impious creeds of theology:
" that while these concrete elements in which each creed embodies
this soul of truth are bad as measured by an absolute standard,
they are a good as measured by a relative standard." ' The stand-
ard is relative with a personal God; absolute with an unknowable
Somewhat. But how can the nescience of Spencer reach an abso-
lute standard? If this Absolute is utterly unknowable, there can
be no knowledge of an absolute standard of religion. The fount-
ain of charity still flows. Toleration for the impious creeds is a
duty because " these various beliefs are parts of the constituted
order of things; and not accidental but necessary parts. Seeing
how one or other of them is every-where present, is of perennial
growth, and when cut down redevelops in a form but slightly
modified, we cannot avoid the inference that they are needful ac-
companiments of human life, severally fitted to the societies in
which they are indigenous. From the highest point of view, we
must recognize them as elements in that great evolution of which
the beginning and the end are beyond our knowledge or concep-
tion— as modes of manifestation of the Unknowable; and as having
this for their warrant. " '^ A solace for the Christian conscience in
an imj)ious worship. There is still a grave question which the
charity of Spencer has strangely overlooked. It is the question
whether this palliation may continue in the higher light of his own
j)hilosopliy of the Unknowable. On the other hand, Ave may even
suggest a doubt whether he might not have made a more gracious
use of the fact that the impious creeds are necessary parts in the
evolution of the great Unknowable. It was clearly open for him
to ^ay that, as necessary parts in this evolution, they could not be
impious even in the Avorship of a personal God. Enough has been
said to shoAV that in tlie doctrine of Spencer personality
LIMITATION'S . ... . ,.. iTr>-
OF PKRsoN- is a limitation and in contradiction to the Infinite.
AI.ITY. That such is the doctrine of Hamilton and Mansel
will appear under the next head.
^ First Principles, p. 121. ^ Ibid., pi). 121, 122.
DENIAL OF DIVINE PERSONALITY. 139
2. Erroneous Doctrine of the Infinite and Absolute. — As these
terms are used in an abstract form, they are not properly definitive,
but terms in need of definition. The definition whicli renders
them essentially contradictory to personality gives a sense for which
there is no need in human thought, no evidence of truth in reality,
and certainly not the true sense of the divine infinity and absolute-
ness. In order to reach the truth in the case we require, first, the
sense of the terms in the philosophy which makes them contradictory
to personality, and, secondly, their true sense in application to God.
To the terms infinite and absolute Sir William Hamilton adds
the term unconditioned as of special significance in his
f , _ ° THE INFINITE
philosojjhy. He notes their distinction, and holds the of agnosti-
first two to be related to the third as species to genus.' ^""^'
Hence the unconditioned is with him the deepest term. These
distinctions, however, do not specially concern the relation of the
doctrine embodied in the terms to the question of the divine
personality.
The doctrine of Hamilton, as given in the definition of these
terms, denies to the unconditioned, and hence to the
/ ^ WITHOUT
infinite and absolute, causal agency, or, at least, holds causal
such agency to be a contradiction in thought to the agency.
unconditioned. "A cause is a relative, and what exists absolutely
as a cause exists absolutely under relation. Schelling has justly
observed that ' he would deviate wide as the poles from the idea of
the absolute who would think of defining its nature by the notion
of activity.' But he who would define the absolute by the notion
of caiise would deviate still more widely from its nature; inasmuch
as the notion of a cause involves not only the notion of a deter-
mination to activity, but of a determination to a particular, nay,
a dependent, kind of activity — an activity not immanent, but
transeunt, " ^ If the absolute cannot be a cause, or if the notion of
causation is contradictory to the absolute, then either God cannot
be the absolute, or his personality must be contradictory in thought
to his absoluteness; for the power of causal agency is central to the
notion of personality. The sense of the absolute or unconditioned
thus appears in the doctrine of Hamilton as contradictory to the
divine ^personality.
Mansel is properly the expositor of Hamilton, and more fully
sets forth the implications of his doctrine of the uncon- doctrine op
ditioued as contradictory to the notion of divine per- mansel.
sonality. It is proper to cite a few passages from his treatment of
this question.
^Discussions, pp. 20, 21. '^ Ibid., p. 40.
140 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
" To conceive the Deity as he is, we must conceive him as First
Cause, as Absolute, and as Infinite. By the First Cause is meant
that which produces all things, and is itself produced by none. By
the Absolute is meant that which exists in and by itself, having no
necessary relation to any other Being. By the Infinite is meant
that which is free from all possible limitation; that than which a
greater is inconceivable; and which, consequently, can receive no
additional attribute or mode of existence, which it had not from
all eternity." ' Little exception need be taken to these definitions
BO far as the true sense of the terms is concerned, but exception
must be taken to the erroneous inferences drawn from them or the
false sense given in further statements. '^The metaphysical repre-
PANTHEisTic scntatiou of the Deity, as absolute and infinite, must
IMPLICATION, necessarily, as the profoundest metaphysicians have
acknowledged, amount to nothing less than the sum of all reality.
'What kind of an Absolute Being is that,' says Hegel, 'which does
not contain in itself all that is actual, even evil included?' We
may repudiate the conclusion with indignation; but the reasoning
is unassailable."^ The reasoning is unassailable only on an ex-
treme and false sense of the absolute, which is contradictory to the
co-existence of the finite, and equally contradictory to the person-
ality of God. This consequence appears in the further words of
Mansel: "A cause cannot, as such, be absolute: the vVbsolute can-
not, as such, be a cause. . . . How can the Infinite become that
which it was not from the first? If causation is a possible mode
of existence, that which exists without causing is not infinite ; tliat
Avliich becomes a cause has passed beyond its former limits."' A
power of causation may be reckoned an intrinsic mode of being,
but the becoming a cause is not such a mode. Hence becoming a
cause is not the acquisition of any new quality of being. These
obvious and valid distinctions bring to naught the logic of the
above passage. But the sense of the infinite and absolute as therein
given is openly contradictory to the divine personality; for person-
ality and the power of causal agency are inseparable truths. The
same contradictory sense runs through the furtlier treatment of
the question. A necessary causation is contradictory to the infinite
and absolute. A voluntary causation is equally contradictory, be-
cause it implies consciousness.* The same contradictory sense is
thus manifest; for it i^ needless to say that consciousness is an es-
sential fact of personality.
Thus, in the doctrine of the infinite and absolute as maintained
' Limits of Religious Thought, p. 75. ' Ibid., p. 76. ^ Ibid., p. 77.
*Ibid., pp. 77-79.
DENIAL OF DIVINE PERSONALITY. 141
by Hamilton and Mansel, personality is not only an inevitable limi-
tation in human conception, but must be intrinsically
^ . ' . . •' PERSONALITY
a limitation. The reasoning proceeds in this manner: denied the
Consciousness can only be conceived under the form "^^'^ite.
of a variety of attributes; and the different attributes are, by their
very diversity, conceived as finite. The conception of a moral nat-
ure— even as we must think of a moral nature in God — is in itself
the conception of a limit.' But God cannot be a person without a
distinction of attributes, nor a moral personality without a moral
nature. If such facts are contradictory to the infinite and abso-
lute, does it not follow that we must either deny these qualities to
God or deny his personality? It certainly follows that so far as in
religious thought God is conceived as a person he is neither infinite
nor absolute. Thus from Mansel: "But personality, as we con-
ceive it, is essentially a limitation and a relation." ^
Herbert Spencer maintains substantially the same doctrine of
the Absolute, as the ground of contingent existences.
'_ " ^ O ^ SPENCERS
How must we think of the First Cause, if we can think doctrine the
of it at all? "It must be independent. If it is not ^^^^'
independent it cannot be the First Cause; for that must be the
First Cause on which it depends. . . . But to think of the First
Cause as totally independent is to think of it as that which exists
in the absence of all other existence. . . . Not only, however, must
the First Cause bo a form of being which has no necessary relation
to any other form of being, but it can have no necessary relation
within itself. There can be nothing in it which determines change,
and yet nothing which prevents change. For if it contains some-
thing which imposes such necessities or restraints, this something
must be a cause higher than the First Cause, which is absurd.
Thus the First Cause must be in every sense perfect, complete,
total: including within itself all power, and transcending all law.
Or, to use the established v/ord, it must be absolute. " '' How causa-
tion, as necessary to finite existences, can arise in such an absolute
is a question for Mr. Spencer to answer. The only modes of ac-
tion are in spontaneity or necessity; but both are denied to the ab-
solute. Yet there can be no causation without action.
The doctrine of Spencer is further given thus: " The objects
and actions surrounding us, not less than the phenom- ^^3^ be ^
ena of our own consciousness, compel us to ask a cause; "'R^t capse.
in our search for a cause, we discover no resting-place until we ar-
rive at the hypothesis of a First Cause; and v/e have no alternative
' Limits of Religious Thought, p. 127. ^ Ibid., p. 103.
^ First Princijjles, p, 38.
142 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
but to regard this First Cause as the Infinite and Absolute." ' No
exception could be taken to these positions, but for the false doc-
trine of the Infinite and Absolute, which equally with that of Ham-
ilton and Mansel excludes the divine personality. Indeed, Spencer
appropriates their doctrine, and freely cites their discussions in its
support.
It should be said that Spencer adheres to this doctrine with a
consistency which can scarcely be accorded these eminent Christian
philosophers. In his own philosophy there was no need, as in their
theology, to dispose of the doctrine in consistency with Christian
theism. He repudiates their appeal to faith in God as an immedi-
ate and necessary datum of the religious consciousness. If a per-
sonal God is thus saved to their theology, it is difficult to see in
what consistency with their doctrine of the infinite and absolute.
This faith, even if a reality, cannot cancel the contradiction of
that doctrine to the divine personality. What, then, is God as
thus saved in theology? He cannot be both a person and the in-
finite and absolute. Or if held to be both, it is against the contra-
diction of thought. This cannot be satisfactory.
Such an absolute and infinite as appears in the doctrine under
notice is no immediate truth, and no requirement of
THE TRfF
CADSF. NOT the mind. In the activities of thought the finite may
GIVEN. suggest the infinite, the conditioned the absolute, the
temporal the eternal, the changeable the immutable; but the
truth or objective reality of these suggestions is not thus either
given or required. Much less is such an infinite and absolute as
posited in the doctrine under notice either given or required. The
necessity of thought, the only necessity, and comprehensive of the
whole, is for a cause of finite and dependent existences. The ne-
cessity is definitely and only for such a cause as will account for the
finite and dependent. Such a cause is no impersonal infinite and
absolute. The . original or first cause which answers to the neces-
sity of thought must possess the power of a beginning, and an in-
telligence equal to the order and adjustments of the cosmos; must
be equal to the origination of rational and moral personalities. A
personal God, and only a personal God, can answer to this neces-
sity of thought.
There is no such an infinite and absolute as that posited in the
NO SUCH AN doctrine of Hamilton and Spencer; certainly no need
INFINITE. of it in human thought, and no proof of it in human
reason. There must be an eternal being; for otherwise present ex-
istences must have sprung from nothing, which is unthinkable.
' First Principles, p. 38.
DENIAL OF DIVINE PERSONALITY. 143
An eternal being is by no necessity eternally the totality of being.
Nor need it ^e such an infinite and absolute that it must at once
exclude all distinction of attributes and modes, and yet necessarily
include all actualities and possibilities of both. The infinite which
must forever be the totality of being is an infinite in the sense of
magnitude or bulk, and so space-filling as to allow no room for any
other existence. " To think of the First Cause as finite is to
think of it as limited. To think of it as limited, necessarily im-
plies a conception of something beyond its limits: it is absolutely
impossible to conceive a thing as bounded without conceiving a
region surrounding its boundaries. What now must we say of this
region? If the First Cause be limited, and there consequently lies
something outside of it, this something must have no First Cause —
must be uncaused. . . . Thus it is impossible to think of the First
Cause as finite. And if it cannot be finite it must be infinite." '
With all the use of causal terms, the First Cause is ^ j,ere bulk
here treated simply as being, not as causal agency, infinite.
The being is an infinite magnitude, a bulk filling all space. It is a
very crude notion. It is only such an infinite that can allow no
room for the finite. God is not such an infinite. There is no such
an infinite. The absolute which is, and must forever be, so unre-
lated that it cannot be a cause — such an absolute being, if an exist-
ence at all, must be a dead existence, and therefore utterly useless
for any requirement of thought or any rational account of the
universe.
The doctrine of Hamilton and Mansel was maintained in the
interest of Christian theology, as against the German ,.. ^„„...„
~'' . ~ . . AIM OF HAMIL-
transcendentalism, the drift of which was into ration- ton and man-
alism and pantheism. It is true, however, that the
contention of Hamilton was more directly with Cousin, who held
with the German transcendentalists the capacity of the soul for an
immediate cognitive vision of the Infinite, though with the rejec-
tion of its pantheistic implication. The refutation of this tran-
scendentalism should in itself be reckoned a valuable service; but
the method of it involves a detriment not less than the gain.
There was no necessity for the nescience of the Infinite which the
method involved, or for the representation of personality as con-
tradictory to the divine infinity. In the doctrine of an imme-
diate and necessary faith in the divine personality there is little
relief from the agnosticism which, for our reason, sinks the person-
ality of God in his infinity. It is not pretended that this faith
either changes the sense of the Infinite or replaces the consequent
' Spencer ; First Principles, pp. 37, 38.
144 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
nescience with any true knowledge of God. Hence God is still
THEisTic NFS- ^^jond tlic rcacH of cognitive thought. We may affirm
ciENCE RE- his personality as an immediate datum of the religious
consciousness, but for rational thought personality is
still a limitation. Hence God can be the Infinite for faith only by
a divorcement of faith from rational thought; indeed, only against
the contradiction of thought. " It is greatly to be lamented that
men should teach that the only way in which it is possible for us
to form any idea of God leads to no true knowledge. It does not
teach us what God is, but what we are forced against reason to
think he is."'
3. The True Infinite and Absolute. — In the true sense of these
terms in application to God we shall find their consistency with his
personality.
The true sense of these terms must be determined in view of
TRUE SENSE OK ^^^^ subjcct of tliclr prcdicatiou. Only in the observ-
THE iNFiMTK. aucc of thls pHuciple can we reach any definite or clear
result. There may be an infinite and absolute without relevancy
to any question respecting the co-existence of the finite, or the con-
sistency of causation and personality with itself. Or these terms
may be used in a false sense, and are so used in the doctrine of the
unconditioned.
Space is infinite and absolute — without either limitation or rela-
tion. Yet it is neither the ground nor cause nor quality of any
existing thing. There are what we call the spatial qualities of be-
ing, but these are purely from the nature of the being, and are in
no sense caused or affected by the nature of space. A body may
occupy space, or rest or move in space, and undergo great change,
so that a chaos shall become a cosmos, but space itself is ever the
same, and without any effect upon that which occupies it or trans-
pires in it. Hence the questions whether the infinite and absolute
must be the totality of being, and unrelated, and impersonal, can
have no relevancy to such an infinite and absolute as space.
The same is true of duration, also infinite and absolute — without
limit and unrelated. Succcssional events and uniform revolutions
of bodies which mark off periods of time to us do not affect dura-
tion itself: neither does duration affect them. The power of time
to affect existences and to work changes is purely a figure of speech.
All such changes are from interior constitution or exterior influ-
ence, in neither of which has duration any part. It is without in-
fluence upon any thing, and is itself unaffected by any. Hence
there can be no relevancy in the questions whether such an infinite
' Hodge : Systematic Theology, vol. i, p. 344.
DENIAL OF DIVINE PERSONALITY. 145
and absolute can admit the co-existence of the finite and become
the relative through causal agency.
We have previously noted the crude and contradictory notion of
the infinite in the sense of quantity or space-filling be-
ing, and so space-filling as to preclude all other exist- of a quanti-
ences — a sense which certainly can have no application tative inki-
N ITF
to God. Yet this sense ever appears in the transcend-
ental philosophy of the infinite, and is too often jDresent in the doc-
trine of Hamilton and Mansel. " The very prevalent tendency in
philosophic speculation on this subject, to argue as if ' our idea of
infinity arises from the contemplation of quantity, and the endless
increase the mind is able to make in quantity, by the repeated ad-
ditions of what portions thereof it pleases,' ' has led to various uses
of the term ^infinite,' which are not only inapplicable to the Di-
vine Being, but even contradictory of his nature. Such, for ex-
ample, are these: 'an infinite line,' 'an infinite surface,' and 'an.
infinite number.' All such expressions have obviously been used
from a tacit admission that ' our idea of infinity arises from the
contemplation of quantity.' But, as I have said, the terms 'infi-
nite' and 'unlimited,' while they apply to the nature of God, do
not explain what that nature is, and as soon as the nature of the ■
Deity is indicated all these expressions immediately disappear,.
When it is declared that God is a spirit it is affirmed that God is
not extended, and that all references to quantity are inapplicable to
him."' A being infinite in the sense of quantity, and therefore
preclusive of finite existences, must be infinite in spatial extension.
Thus the notion inevitably becomes materialistic with respect to
both the infinite being and the finite existences in qiiestion; for
otherwise the question of co-existence could not arise, ^g bi-lk in-
There is no such an infinite. Whatever is extended in finitk.
space in the manner of material bodies must be actually divisible
into parts, and nothing thus divisible can be infinite. The parts
must be finite, and yet equal to the whole; therefore the whole can-
not be infinite, because the finite parts, however many or great,
cannot make an infinite. There is no actually infinite line, or sur-
face, or number. The crude and contradictory notion of the in-
finite in any sense of quantity should be eliminated from this ques-
tion. Martineau, having cited from Mansel a passage in which
there is too much of that notion, says with force: " Now what does
all this prove? This, and this only: that if we take the words
' Absolute ' and ' Infinite ' to mean that he to whom they are ap-
' Locke: Essay, book ii, chap, xvii, sec. 7.
^ Calderwood : Philosophy of the Infinite, pp. 183, 18-L
11
146 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
plicable chokes up the universe, mental and physical, and prevents
the existence of every one else, then it is nonsense and clear con-
tradiction for any one else, who is conscious of his own existence,
to use these words of God at all. Surely this might have been said
without so mucli circumlocution. And what does Mr. Mansel
thereby gain? Simply, so far as we can see, that he has estab-
lished the certain non-existence of any Being in this sense ' abso-
lute ' or 'infinite.'"'
The summary method which posits an infinite and absolute
ground of things, and then denies its consistency with
DIVINE PER- *= ,1 T -.i 1 Ti. 1 1 • J.
soNALiTY NOT pcrsonality, cannot be admitted, it has no claim to
TivE^D^ by"^a admission on the ground of either a priori or inductive
FALSE DEFiNi- truth. The inconsistency alleged is in the definition
^'°''*' of the terms, not in their true sense as predicates of the
First Cause. The inference of inconsistency may be legitimate to
the premise as determined by definition, but the premise itself is
an instance of the sheerest material fallacy. The question of the
divine personality cannot be thus negatively concluded. It is the
great question of the divine reality, and cannot be disposed of by
a false definition. God is what he is. As an eternal being, there
is no cause of his existence, and no reason for his being what he is
or other than he is. Hence no a priori assumption can be valid
against his personality. The reality of a ground of finite and de-
pendent existences is given as a necessity of thought, and only the
boldest phenomenalism or positivism can question its truth. But,
as we previously found, the same law of thought requires by an
equal necessity the personality of the First Cause.
The true sense of the infinite and absolute in their application
to God is given in the perfection of his personal at-
FimiriN'^PER- tributes. This accords with the principle previously
soxALPERFEc- Dotcd, that tlic scnso of these terms must be deter-
mined by the nature of the subject of their application.
God in personality is here the subject. AVe must not anticipate,
further than the requirement of the present question, what more
properly belongs to the treatment of the divine attributes; but we
cannot conclude the present question without reference to these at-
tributes. We need not include all.
God is infinite in knowledge and power. Omniscience and om-
nipotence are his personal attributes. It may be objected that ob-
jects of the divine knowledge and products of the divine power are
finite, and therefore no conclusive manifestation of an infinite knowl-
edge and power. Things known to God are mostly finite; yet they are
^Essays, Philosophical and Theological, vol. i, pp. 291, 292.
DENIAL OF DIVINE PERSONALITY. 147
such in number, complexity, and relation, especially as we include
the possible with the actual, that only an omniscient mind can know
them as he knows them. God has perfect knowledge of himself,
and this is infinite knowledge of the infinite. Dependent existences
are finite; yet the power which produced them, and, according to
their nature as physical or spiritual, set them in their order or en-
dowed them with intellectual and moral reason, must be infinite.
There is an infinite love of God.
It will be easy for the doctrine of the conditioned as the utmost
limit of human thought, with its inevitable nescience distinction
of God, to attempt a criticism of this view. With a of attributks
' r . . CON S I S T E N T
ready relapse into the crude and contradictory notion of with infin-
a quantitative infinity, it must object to a triplicity of "'^•
infinites, with the implication of a fourth — an infinite God with
three infinite attributes. But the criticism falls with the false and
contradictory notion of an infinite magnitude or quantity. God is
a spiritual being, and, with a distinction of attributes, a simple
unity of being, without any spatial or quantitative quality. His
measureless personal perfections are not preclusive of finite exist-
ences. Infinite knowledge, power, and love are neither recipro-
cally preclusive nor a limitation of each other. The divine knowl-
edge is not the less for all the knowledge of finite minds, nor the
divine power less for all the forces of physical nature or power of
finite wills, nor the divine love less for all the love of human and
angelic spirits.
God is the absolute. The absolute is the self-sufficient, the un-
conditioned, the unrelated, except as voluntarily re-
lated. Any sense of the absolute which excludes even
the possibility of relation must be false to the ground or cause of
finite and dependent existences. Causal agency is the only orig-
inal of the finite and dependent; but such original must come
into relation to its own agency and effects. An absolute, therefore,
which cannot become related cannot be the ground of the finite
and dependent. Gcd as an eternal personal being, with the per-
fections of infinite knowledge and power and the free determina-
tion of his own agency, is absolute in the truest, deepest sense
of the term. We challenge a comparison with the transcendental
absolute which precludes personality. Such an absolute must for-
ever remain unrelated, and therefore can account for nothing.
Otherwise, the finite, and self-conscious personalities, as really as
material forms of existence, must be accounted as purely phe-
nomenal, with the result of a monism which at bottom is pan-
theism. Far truer and grander is the view of a personal God,
GOD THE TRUE
ABSOLUTE.
148 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
infinite in his perfections, with the power of free causal agency.
God is the true absolute.
Thus we find the divine personality consistent with the truest,
VOLUNTARY dccpest scuse of the infinite and absolute. The true
R K L A T I o N s gensc is not in beinff itself, but in the perfection of be-
CONSIST F NT
WITH THE AB- Ing or thc perfection of attributes. " The infinite is
SOLUTE. ^Q^ ^Q \yQ yiewed as having an independent being, it is
not to be regarded as a substance or a separate entity; it is simply
the quality of a thing, very possibly the attribute of the attribute
of an object. Thus we apply the phrase to the Divine Being to
denote a perfection of his nature; we apply it also to all his per-
fections, such as his wisdom and goodness, which we describe as
infinite. '^ ' " We cannot think of God as the unconditioned Being
conditioning himself, without conceiving him as Reality, Effi-
ciency, and Personality. These constitute the conception of the
divine essence whereby it is what it is. AYlien we think of the
attributes of such a Being we must necessarily conceive them as
Absolute, Infinite, and Perfect."'' " In particular, Mansel sought
to show that God could not be thought of as cause, because as cause
it must bo related to its effect. He cannot, then, be creator, be-
cause as such there must be a relation between God and the world.
But this objection overlooks the fact that relation in the abstract
does not imply dependence. The criticism would be just if the
relation were necessary and had an external origin. But as the re-
lation is properly posited and maintained by himself there is noth-
ing in it incompatible with his independence and absoluteness. " '
As we thus expose and eliminate the contradictory notion of a
quantitative infinite and absolute, and find the true sense of the
terms in the perfection of personal attributes, their consistency
with the divine personality is manifest. Only a jsersonal God, in-
finite and absolute in the perfection of his attributes, can answer
in human thought for any rationale of finite and dependent exist-
ences. God in personality is the true infinite and absolute.
4. Personality the Highest Perfection. — This we confidently
maintain against the assumption of pantheism, and against the
theistic nescience which posits an infinite and absolute inconsistent
with personality. The qu'estion may be appealed to the clearest
logical judgment and to the profoundest intuitions of the reason.
In the orders of existence directly known to us man is the highest,
and the highest by virtue of the facts of personality. If this be not
' McCosh : Intuitions of the Mind, p. 197.
* Cocker : Theistic Conception of the World, p. 41.
* Bowue : Metaphysics, p. 131.
DENIAL OF DIVINE PERSONALITY. 149
the truth, then Judgment and reason are no longer trustworthy
and we are incapable of any rational treatment of the „ „„„.„^^
-L •' PERSONALITY
question. Judgment and reason are trustworthy, and at the head
the truth we stated is above question. With this basis ^^ existence.
of truth, we may rise to the thought of God, and find in per-
sonality the highest conception of his perfection. In all the range
of being, finite and infinite, personal attributes are the highest.
What impersonal terms can replace the -personal with any compara-
ble idea of God? In the vague and contradictory use of the terms
infinite, absolute, unknowable, inscrutable, in application to the
original cause of finite and dependent existences, with personality
lost in the confusion, there is an infinite descent from the notion of
God as personal cause.
There is a false principle underlying all the speculations in which
personality is held to be a limitation. It is the princi-
ple that all determination, predication, or distinction pleoflimita"
of attributes is a limitation, or, in the extreme form of ^lox in per-
SONALITY,
Spinoza, a negation. We cannot know the infinite and
absolute, because as such it exists out of all limitation and relation.
If we predicate intelligence, will, affection, causal agency of God,
we so distinguish his attributes and bring him into relation to the
products of his agency as to deny his infinity and absoluteness.
This denial is on the principle that all predication is limitation or
negation. This point is so admirably treated by another that the
citation of his words should be heartily approved.
" If I do not mistake, the whole system of those reasonings rests
on an error common to skepticism and pantheism, which formerly
misled, and still deceives, many a superior mind. This error con-
sists in maintaining that every determination is a negation. Omnis
determinatio negatio est, says Hamilton after Spinoza. Nothing
can be falser or more arbitrary than this principle. It arises from
the confusion of two things essentially different, namely, the limits
of a being, and its determinate and constitutive characteristics. I
am an intelligent being, and my intelligence is limited; these are
two facts equally certain. The possession of intelligence is the
constitutive characteristic of my being, which distinguishes me
from the brute being. The limitation imposed on my intellect,
which can only see a small number of truths at a time, is my limit,
and this is what distinguishes me from the Absolute Being, from
the Perfect Intelligence which sees all truths at a single glance.
That which constitutes my imperfection is not, certainly, my being
intelligent; therein, on the contrary, lies the strength, the rich-
ness, and the dignity of my being. What constitutes my weakness
150 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
and my nothingness is that this intelligence is inclosed in a nar-
row circle. Thus, inasmuch as I am intelligent, I participate in
being and perfection; inasmuch as I am only intelligent within
certain limits, I am imperfect.
" It follows from this very simple analysis that determination
and negation, far from being identical, differ from each other as
much as being and nothing. According as a being has more or
less determinations, qualities, and sj)ecific characteris-
THE GKADE OF ,. •, • -, 1 1 j. 1 • xl.
BEiNG AS ITS ^^^^> ^^ occupics a rauk more or less elevated in the
DETERMiNA- gcalo of cxistcnce. Thus, in proportion as you sup-
press qualities and determinations, you sink from the
animal to the vegetable, from the vegetable to brute matter. On
the other hand, exactly in proportion as the nature of beings is
complicated, in proportion as their bodies are enriched with new
functions and organs, as their intellectual and moral faculties be-
gin to be displayed, as more delicate senses are added to their
grosser senses, to sensation, memory, to memory, imagination, then
the superior faculties, reasoning, and reason, and will, )^ou rise
nearer and nearer to man, the most complicated being, the most de-
termined and the most perfect in creation. . . . God is the only
being absolutely determined. For there must be something inde-
termined in all finite beings, since they have always imperfect pow-
ers, which tend toward their development after an indefinite manner.
God alone the complete Being, the Being in whom all powers
are actualized, escapes by his own perfection from all progress,
and development, and indetermination. It would be a pure illu-
sion to imagine that different determinations could, by any chance,
limit or contradict each other. Could intelligence prevent liberty?
or the love of the beautiful extinguish the love of the good ? or
truth, or beauty, or haj)piness be any hinderance, the one to the
other? Is it not evident, on the contrary, that these are things
perfectly analogous and harmonious, which, far from exclud-
ing, require each other, which always go together in the best be-
ings of the universe, and, when they are conceived in their eternal
harmony and plenitude, constitute the living unity of God ?
'' Now, let us hear our skeptics. They say the Absolute excludes
PERFECTION OF allliuiits, aud, consequently, all determination. I re-
DETERMiNA- pjy thc Absolutc has no limits, it k true, that is to
TION THE PER- , i • ^ • i ^ .,.
SECTION OF say, that his being and the powers that are in him are
°^°' all full, complete, infinite, eternal; but far from these
determinations limiting his being, they characterize and consti-
tute it."'
' Saisset : Modern Pantheism, vol. ii, pp. 69-72.
DENIAL OF DIVINE PERSONALITY. 151
Unity is a perfection of being; but the highest unity lies in the
harmony of differentiated qualities. Man, most complex of creat-
urely orders directly known to us, is yet a higher unity than any
other. This higher unity is in personality; and personality is the
highest perfection. In the plenitude and harmony of personal at-
tributes in God there is an infinite perfection of unity. Herbert
Spencer was far astray from truth and reason in saying that the
question of personality in the First Cause was not a question be-
tween personality and something lower, but one between person-
ality and something higher. There is nothing higher. Person-
ality is the highest perfection. Being without quali-
•^ . . . PERSONALITY'
ties or attributes is a blank in itself, and a blank for thk perfkc-
thought. " Also, it must be added, that it is a strange ^'"'' °*' ^^°-
perversion of thought which takes this caput mortuum, this logical
phantom, and gives it the place of the highest reality, the object
of profoundest veneration, in bowing down to which science and
religion are to find their ultimate reconciliation. For, in so doing,
we are simply turning away from all the concrete wealth of the
world of thought and being, and deifying the barest, thinnest ab-
straction of logic. It is not too much to say that almost any object
of reverence would be more worthy than this, and that in nature-
worship, animal worship, even the lowest f etichism, there is a higher
cultus than in the blind veneration of the philosophic Absolute." '
If we compare the Absolute of pantheism, or as posited in the
doctrine of Hamilton and Spencer, with the theistic
^ ' BIBLICAL COiN-
conception of Moses and the prophets and ajDostles, the ception ok
infinite transcendence of the latter must be manifest. ^°"'
Can any impersonal somewhat, however styled, be comparable with
the divine Father as revealed by the divine Son? Personality is
the highest perfection of the Absolute.''
II. Denial of Divine Cognoscibility.
1. Tlie Infinite Declared UntlmiTcahle. — It is the doctrine of
Hamilton and Mansel, as also of others, that the Infinite is un-
knowable and unthinkable. As in relation to Grod, this is the doc-
trine of theistic nescience. God may be the object of faith, but is
beyond the reach of cognitive thought. This consequence is inevi-
' Caird : Philosophy of Religion, p. 38.
"^ Cocker : Theistic Conception of the World, pp. 43, 43 ; Martineau : Essays,
vol. i, pp. 292, 293 ; Fisher : Oroimds of Theistic and Christian Belief, pp.
69-71 ; Herbert : Modern Realism, pp. 408-423 ; Maiisel : Limits of Religious
Thought, pp. 103, 104 ; Christlieb : Modern Doubt and Christian Belief, Third
Lectiwe, iii, iv.
152 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
table, if the principles of the doctrine be true. Religious thought,
iust as thought in any other sphere, is conditioned by
LIMITATION or •> . . *^
RKi, loious the mental capacity. There might be a revelation of
THOUGHT. truths undiscoverable by the mind itself, or a divine
illumination which should raise the power of thought to its highest
capacity, but this power would still be conditioned by the mental
capacity. Nor is there for us any immediate vision of God wherein
we may grasp him in a comprehensive knowledge. These facts
disprove the transcendentalism which Hamilton controverted, but
they neither imply nor prove the nescience of God which he main-
tained.
The analysis of this doctrine will place it in a clearer view.
ANALYSIS OP Thought is finite and relative; therefore it can have no
THE DOCTRINE, cognitivc appreliensioii of the infinite and absolute.
The only movement of thought toward the infinite is in thinking
away the finite. The thinking is thus purely negative, and the
infinite forever reacliless. In denying the qualities of the finite to
the infinite the finite sui')plies the whole content of thought. The
absolute is both unrelated and infinite, while thought is condi-
tioned by relations or a distinction of qualities, both of which are
declared to be contradictory to the absolute. With such elements
of the doctrine, it follows that, if God is such an infinite and ab-
solute, he is unknowable and unthinkable.
8uch a doctrine of theistic nescience is spread widely upon the
pages of Hamilton and Mansel in the treatment of this question.
The culmination of the doctrine is in these words: " The Divinity,
in a certain sense, is revealed; in a certain sense is concealed:
CULMINATION ^6 Is at oucc kuowu and unknown. But the last
IN woKsiiip. and highest consecration of all true religion must be
an altar — Ayvwcrrw Gtoj — ' To the unknown and unhnoioable
God.""
Such an altar Paul found in Athens. Was this the last and
highest consecration of all true religion? It was such in style, if
not in truth. However many and great the errors and supersti-
tions of the Athenians, it seems that this altar signified no defect
of either truth or worship. Yet Paul assumes a very serious de-
fect in both. Plainly in his mind the ignorance of their worship
was in their ignorance of the true God. Him therefore he would
declare or make known, that they might worship him in truth.
Paul had not attained to this theistic agnosticism. Hence in the
declaration of the true God there is not a word about an unthink-
able infinite, or an absolute blank for thought; there is the declara-
' Hamilton : Discussions, p. 22.
DENIAL OF DIVINE COGNOSCIBILITY. 153
tion of a personal God, Creator and Lord of all, and whoso off-
spring we are.'
2. Concerning the Limitafion of Religious Thoiight. — As pre-
vioiisly stated, religious thought, just as thought on other ques-
tions, is conditioned by the mental capacity and the laws of think-
ing. The mind does not become divine by the study of divine
things. The thinking is still human, however divine the subject,
or whatever the divine revelation or illumination. Christianity
makes no pretension to a comprehensive knowledge of God. Such
a pretension is the extravagance of the transcendentalism which
professedly grasps the Infinite in the mode of an immediate vision,
but mostly loses the divine j^ersonality in the pretended knowledge.
Alonff the Christian centuries it has been the wont of
° . NO COMPRE-
theologians to confess the inadequacy of thought to the iiension of
full comprehension of God. It was very easy, therefore, ^^°'
for Hamilton, as for others, to array such eminent Christian authors
— Tertullian, C}-prian, Augustine, Chrysostom, Grotius, Pascal, and
others — as witnesses to this limitation of religious thought. He
could hardly claim their authority for his own doctrine of theistic
nescience. Surely such a doctrine was far from their thought.
Their meaning was simply the divine incomprehensibility — a very
familiar truth in Christian theology. Hence their utterances are
valueless for the doctrine of theistic nescience as against the doc-
trine of a true knowledge of God in religious thought.
3. God Truly Knowable. — There may be a true knowledge —
true in the measure of it — which is not fully comprehensive of its
subject. It is easy to embody the contrary doctrine in a definition
of thinking. If such definition be true, God must be
" . _ ' AGNOSTIC DEF-
unthinkable and unknowable. Cognitive thought must i n i t i o n of
fully compass the subject. But human thought can- '^^^'"^^'^•
not compass the infinite. Thinking is possible only under condi-
tions of limitation, which must place the infinite beyond the reach
of thought. Such is the summary method of this doctrine. " To
tJiinh is to condition ; and conditional limitation is the fundamental
law of the possibility of thought."^ ManseP and Spencer'* hold
the same doctrine. The meaning is that only the conditioned
and limited is thinkable. The law may be valid against the com-
prehension of God in thought, but is not valid against all cognitive
thought of God.
The central position of this doctrine is that all thought of the
infinite is purely negative, and only of the finite which is denied to
' Acts xvii, 23-31. ^ Hamilton : Discussions, p. 21.
^Limits of Religious Thought, pp. 98, 99. * First Principles, pp. 81, 82.
154 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
the infinite. " The unconditioned is incognizable and inconceiv-
able ; its notion being only of the conditioned, which
THEmFiNiTE ^^^^ ^'"^^ alonc be positively known or conceived."' If
NOT WHOLLY thls be truc, the terms infinite and unconditioned have
NEGATIVK. ... . • -J! -L- i J. i!
no positive meaning, signiiy no positive content oi
thought. Yet, while negative in form, they are predicates in fact,
and therefore must have a positive sense. There can be no j)red-
ication without a subject, and no subject except in positive
thought. The full comprehension of a subject in thought is not
necessary to predication, but the cognitive apprehension of it is
absolutely necessary. We cannot affirm the infinity and absolute-
ness of God without the apprehension of God in thought; for this
would be i^redication without a subject, which the laws of thought
render impossible. 8uch is the fallacious outcome of the doctrine
which places God beyond the reach of cognitive thought.
It is not true that the notion of the unconditioned or infinite is
" only negative " of the finite, and the finite the only content of
thought. We ap^ieal the question to consciousness it-
coNscious- self. Infinite space and infinite duration are more for
^^^^' thought than the mere negation of finiteness. Con-
sciousness is indeed witness that we cannot comprehend either in
thought; but consciousness is equally witness of a form and con-
tent of thought which are not merely of the finite. The same is
true in our thought of God. We cannot indeed fully comprehend
God, but our tbinking is not purely negative, with only the finite
for content. Tlie Infinite is reached in cognitive thought. We
rest this issue on the testimony of consciousness.^
So far, wo have maintained the issue against the nescience of the
Infinite as it is interpreted in this antitheistic agnosticism. In this
view of the question the result is entirely satisfactory. Our posi-
tion is much clearer and stronger with the true notion
THE TRUE IN- ° .11
FINITE TRULY of God as thc Infinite. We have previously shown the
KNowABLE. erroncousness of the doctrine which denies the know-
ableness of the Infinite; that there is no such an Infinite as this
agnosticism maintains; no demand for it in reason; no proof of its
existence; no use for it in tlie universe. Most of all is God not
such an Infinite. God, the true Infinite, is a personal being, with
the attributes of personality in absolute perfection. The essential
attributes of all personality, intellect, sensibility, and will are
realities known in our own consciousness. That these attributes
' Hamilton : Discussions, p. 19.
- Calderwood : Philosophy of the Infinite, pp. 26&-268 ; Martineau : Essays,
vol. i, pp. 395-298.
DENIAL OF DIVINE COGNOSCIBILITY. 155
are infinite in God does not render them unthinkable or unknow-
able. Through his moral government and providential agency God
is truly knowable. In the view of Spencer, the Absolute is too
great for any apprehension in cognitive thought. The real diffi-
culty for knowledge in his Absolute is in its utter blankness, not
in its greatness. When the false Infinite is replaced with the true,
the personal God, the Infinite is manifestly thinkable and know-
able.
In the results of this discussion it is clearly seen that this form
of antitheistic agnosticism is without force against the truth of
theism.'
' Calderwood : Philosophy of the Infinite ; Fisher : Grounds of Theistic and
Christian Belief, pp. 85-102 ; Harris : The Self-Revelation of God, pp. 172-182 ;
Porter : The Human Intellect, part iv, chap, viii ; Martineau : Essays, Philo-
sophical and Theological, vol. i, pp. 224-243 ; Bascom : Philosoiyhy of Religion,
chap, iv ; Herbert: Moder'n Realism, pp. 430-441.
General reference. — Theistic literature has become so voluminous that only
a selection can be given in such a reference. We shall not be careful to omit
all works previously referred to, or from which citations have been made.
Cudworth : The Intellectual System of the Universe / Howe : The Living
Temple, part i; Paley : Natural Theology ; The Bridgewater Treatises ; Hickok :
Creation and Creator ; Saisset : Modern Pantheism; Diman : The Theistic Ar-
gument; Argyll: The Reign of Law; Chadbourne : Natural Theology; Ran-
dies : First Principles of Faith ; Han-is : Philosophical Basis of Theism, ; The
Self- Revelation of God ; Tulloch : Theism ; Bowne : Studies in Theism ; Phi-
losophy of Theism ; Thompson : Christian Theism ; Buchanan : Modem Athe-
ism; Blakie : Natural History of Atheism; Flint: Theism; Antitheistic The-
ories ; Cocker : Theistic Conception of the World ; Janet : Final Causes ;
Bishop Foster : Theism.
PART II.
THEOLOGY.
XHKOLOGY.
This part is for the discussion of truths relating directly to God.
For the representation of these truths we place at its head the
single term theology. Some think that its modern use in a much
wider sense renders it inappropriate for such representation. Hence
we often find with it some interpretative phrase or limiting word.
We thus have, in form, theology — doctrine of God; oftener, theol-
ogy proper. This is neither graceful in style nor definitive in
sense. Appropriateness still lies in the etymological sense. The-
ology thus means a doctrine of God, and may properljr represent
all the truths more directly relating to him. Primarily it was used
in this sense. We so use it here; and we thus secure a symmetry
of terms not otherwise attainable for the several parts of systematic
theology.
CHAPTER I.
GOD IN BEING.
I. Being and Attribute.
1. Definitive Sense of Attribute . — In a general sense an attribute
is any thing which may be affirmed of its subject. This wider
sense may include what is accidental as well as what is essential.
In the more definite sense an attribute is any quality or property
which is intrinsic to the subject, which characterizes and differ-
entiates it, and by virtue of which the subject is what it is.
Attribute, property, quality, faculty, power, are in common use
much in the same sense, though mostly with some distinction in
application. Thus extension, solidity, divisibility are properties or
qualities of body; intellect, sensibility, will are faculties or powers
of mind; omniscience, goodness, omnipotence are attributes of God.
We do not allege an invariable uniformity in such distinctions of
application, yet we think them common. We certainly do not use
the term faculty in application to either body or God, while it is
the common term in application to the human mind.
160 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
3. Distinctive Sense of Being. — Qualities are neither possible nor
thinkable as separate or self-subsisting facts. For both thought
and reality body is more than its properties, mind more than its
faculties, God more than his attributes. Sensationalism or pos-
itivism may, in a helpless agnosticism, be content with the sur-
face of things or with the merest phenomenalism; but for deeper
thought, the thought without which there is neither true science nor
philosophy, projDerties, faculties, attributes must have a ground in
essential being. The necessity is as absolute as that of a subject
to its j)redicate in a logical proposition.
The essence of being is a truth of the reason, not a cognition of
experience. The reality is none the less sure because
BEING A TRUTH ^ , t»-, . i ■ • l ^ -i
OK THE REA- sucli a trutli. Physical properties must have a ground
'^^^* in a material substance. Reason equally determines
for the mental faculties a necessary basis in mind. For the divine
attributes there must be a ground in essential divine being. Rea-
son is in each case the indisputable authority. The distinctive
sense of being in God is that it is the ground of his attributes.
3. Connection of Attrihute and Being. — We are again within
the sphere of reason, not in that of experience. As there is no
empirical grasping of essential being, so tliere is no such grasping
of the connection of attribute and subject. Even reason cannot
know the mode of this connection. But reason can and does af-
firm it to be most intrinsic. The connection is in no sense a loose
or separable one. Being is not as a vessel in which attributes may
be placed and from which they may be withdrawn; not as a ground
on which they may repose as a building upon its foundation or a
statue upon its pedestal, and which may remain after their removal.
The connection must bo most intrinsic, so that neither
BEING AND . i . i. -i j.
ATTRIBUTE IS uor cau be Without the other, isemg and attribute
INSEPARABLE. ^^^ scparablc in abstract thought, but inseparable in
reality. Neither can exist without the other. While extension
must have a basis in material body, such body must exist in exten-
sion. "While intellect must have a ground in mind, mind must
have the faculty of intelligence. In the present conditioning rela-
tion of a nervous organism to the activities of the mental powers
their normal working may be interrupted or temporarily suspended,
but they must ever exist potentially in mind, because necessary to
the very notion of mind. In the very being of God are all his
attributes. Without them he would not be God.
4. True Method of Treatment. — While attribute and being are
correlatives of tliought and inseparable in fact, they are separable in
abstract thought, and for clearness of view must be so separated.
BEING AND ATTRIBUTE. 161
Only thus can we attain to the truer notion of attribute and subject
respectively, and in the unity of being.
What is thus generally requisite to a true method is specially
requisite in the study of the truths now in question. A right view
of God as subject is necessary to the truer notion of his attributes,
and therefore to the truer notion of himself. It is only in a dis-
tinctive view of God as subject that we can reach the ground of a
scientific classification and category of his attributes.
5. Common Error of Metliod. — The common error in the treat-
ment of these questions is in tlie omission of all distinction between
the being of God and his attributes — such an error as would appear
in the omission of all distinction between subject and predicate,
which must render impossible any logical process or result. The
truths which directly relate to God as subject are drawn into the
circle of his attributes. For instance, spirituality, the very essence
of his being, is classed and treated as an attribute. But an attri-
bute of what ? There is nothing deeper than essential being of
which it may be an attribute. With such an error of method, it is
not strange that the classification of the attributes is felt to be most
difficult. The result is that mostly the modes of classification are
purely arbitrary. With a proper distinction between subject and
attribute in God, most of all, with the deepest and most determina-
tive truth of God as the ground of his own attributes, a scientific
classification is clearly attainable. But this question may be de-
ferred for the present, as it must recur with the distinct treatment
of the attributes.^
II. Spikituality of Being.
1. Notion of Being through Attribute. — As the essence of be-
ing is a truth only of the reason, but cognizable only
T 1 1 ^ -x Tj.' i.' 1 J.' ORDER OF TEIE
on some knowledge oi its qualities, so a rational notion questions ov
of the nature of being must be conditioned in a like being and
rrn • 1 c l^ • pi- ATTRIBUTE.
manner, ihis law of the notion of being may seem to
require a study of j^roperties previous to any inquiry into the nature
of the substance in which they are grounded. It would so require
in the case of an entirely new question. But the present is not a
new question; and we may so far anticipate the more direct treat-
ment of the divine attributes as to appropriate our present knowl-
edge of them in a previous inquiry into the divine nature. There
are two other facts which legitimate this course. One is that we
are here directly within the sphere of revelation, pre-eminently the
' Sir William Hamilton: Lectures on Metaphysics, pp. 104-106 ; D. H. Ham-
ilton: Autology, part i, chap, ii ; Porter: The Human Intellect, pp. 619-630.
13
NKCESSARY
CdNSlSTKNCY
162 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
sphere of truth respecting the nature of God as well as of his at-
tributes. The other is that the real question of the divine attri-
butes is not so much the question of their kind as that of their
perfection. A complete analysis of this question finds the attributes
of God to bo distinctively and exclusively personal in kind. But
as such they are involved in the profound question of the personal-
ity of God. The truth of his personality carries with it the truth
of his personal attributes. Tho question of their perfection still
remains; and this is distinctively tlie question of tlie divine attri-
butes. Tlie question of personality may, therefore, properly j^re-
cede this question of the attributes. Personality i^ related to spir-
ituality as its necessary ground. It is true that neither personality
nor spirituidity can be properly treated without a forward glancing
at the personal attributes. But with the distinctive sense of the ques-
tion of the divine attributes it is in the order of a proper method to
treat previously tho questions of both spirituality and personality.
2. Requirement for Spiritual Being. — As the notion of essential
being is conditioned on some knowledge of properties,
so the notion of a distinction of subjects must be
OK ATTRIBUTE tlirougli somc known distinction of properties. As
AND BKINfi. i? -1 J. • T,- J. -i. • 1
an attribute requires a subject, so it requires a sub-
ject answering in kind to its own distinctive quality. The
latter requirement is as absolute as the former. For the two
kinds of facts classed as the projDerties of body and the faculties of
mind reason must imperatively determine essentially distinct and
different subjects. Empirical science can allege nothing of any
weight against this position. It may gratuitously deny any real
distinction betAveen tlie two classes of facts or assert the identity
of tlie mental with the johysical ; or it may pronounce for agnos-
ticism in respect to the nature of matter, and tlien by the covert
assumption of a most pretentious gnosticism proclaim a new face
of matter which accounts for the facts of mind. ISo assumption
could be more gratuitous, no assertion more groundless. It is a
dogmatizing which would shame the method of the most positive
theology. Reason is still the dccisivo authority. While a material
ground can answer for the properties of body, only a spiritual ground
can answer for the faculties of mind. Tho di\dne attributes must
have their ground in spiritual being.
3. Tridli of Divine Spirituality. — The theistic conception cf
the race, while often very crude and low, io without rational expli-
cation except with tlie notion of divine spirituality. The mere
idol is rarely tho Avholc mental conception of the devotee. ' Mostly
' Caird: rhiloao2'>h"j of Religion, p. 177.
SPIRITUALITY OF BEING. 163
it is but the symbol of a being wliom he apprehends, however
dimly and feebly, as cognizant of his life, with power
to help or to harm, and in whose regards, whether of is'^ic^c^oncep-
approval or reprehension, he is deeply concerned. The ^ion of the
divine spirituality is the rational imjslication of these
conceptions. The once prevalent notion of God as the life of nature
or the soul of the world, now known as Hylozoism, has no sufficing
ground in either materialism or pantheism. Even fetichism so far
recognizes a conscious intelligence and agency in the many gods
resident in many things as to rise above both materialism and pan-
theism in a high advance toward the conception of a divine spiritual-
ism. Monotheism, now recognized by the most thorough students
of the question as the primitive faith of the most ancient races,
must be grounded in a divine spirituality.'
The arguments of theism, while conclusive of the divine exist-
ence, are equally conclusive of the divine spirituality. ,j^ ^hk proofs
Spontaneity or the power of personal will is an absolute of thkism.
requirement for the original cosmical cause. The adjustments of the
world and the universe evince the teleology of a divine intelligence.
The anthropological argument finds in a divine mind the only pos-
sible original of human minds, vnth their vast and varied powers,
while their moral constitution i3 conclusive of a moral personality in
their author. These facts require and evince the divine spirituality.
On this question the sense of Scripture is uniform and cleaj-.
The recorded agency of God in creation and ]:)r ovidence,
. ^ . . . . ^ A TRUTH OF
his manifestations m patiiarch:il history and the Jew- the script-
isli theocracy, the theistic conceptions of the sacred ^""^^'
writers, the thoughts and affections which they ascribe to God,
their conception of his transcendence above nature — all these facts
carry with tliam the sense of the divine spirituality.
There are more explicit utterances. God is not only our Creator,
but the Father of our spirits. AVe are liis offspring." explicit ut-
The truth of spirituality in God is thus revealed in tkrances.
our own spiritual being. The same truth is deeply wrought into
the second commandment.^ The full sense of Scrijature is com-
pleted in the explicit words of our Lord: '^God is a Spirit: and
they that worship him must worship Iiiiji in spirit and in truth." '
4. God Only in Spirituality. — If there i:^ no divine spiritual being
there is no God. The inevitable logic of materialism is atheism.
The absolute monistic principle of p.^ntheism, however set forth as
' Gillett: Ood in Human Thought.
'^ Num. xvi, 2^ ; zsvii, 16 ; Acts xvii, 28 ; Heb. xii, 9.
^ Exod. XX, 4. •' John It. 24.
164 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
the cause of all phenomenal facts, is not God. The case is not
other with the alleged attributes of infinite thought and infinite
extension. These are j)urely hypothetic in pantheism, and in no
proper sense intrinsic to the being of God. The former can have
no meaning except as the predicate of an infinite personal mind.
)\ ith these hypothetic attributions, the monistic principle is still
••'ithout consciousness or intelligent agency; a mere force, working
v.-jthout ends or aim. No mere force, though it were omnipotence
itself, can answer to the theistic demands of tlie human soul. It
requires an overseeing conscious intelligence, a ruling providence
and a fatherly love. There must be the assurance of sympathy and
helpfulness in the trying exigencies of life. These imperative re-
quirements are absolutely impossible except in a divine spiritual
being.
5. Immutability of Being. — The question of immutability may
have in relation to God a twofold application: one as a
TWOFOLD . . . . ^^
QUESTION OF predicatc of his essential being; the other as a predicate
IMMUTABILITY. ^£ ^^j^ pcrsonallty, or, more broadly, of his personal
attributes and the principles of his providence. The latter is the
real question of the divine immutability, but properly belongs to
the treatment of the divine attributes. There is truth in the
former application. God is immutable in his essential being.
There is no proof of any change in the essence of the human spirit.
The question is not open to any empirical testing. The unity of
consciousness and the persistence of personal identity through the
extremest changes of the most prolonged life are conclusive against
any such change. There is no proof of any change even in the
essence of matter, however common and great the changes in its
chemical combinations and organic forms. There is no quality of
spirit which can become a law of essential change. What is true
of the human spirit is profoundly true of the absolutely perfect
Spirit. With any law of change in his essential being, he could
not be the true and eternal God.
6. Question of Divine Infinity. — The real question of the infin-
ity or omnipresence of God is a question of the perfection of his
personal attributes, and will be treated in its proper place. The
divine infinity has proved itself a most perplexing question, even
to the profoundest thinkers. We must think that much of this
perplexity arises from an error of method, or, rather,
viKw OF THE from a mistaken sense of the question. The mistake
DIVINE INFIX- ig jjj treating the question in the sense of an infinite
essence, not in the sense of infinite personal attributes.
The ubiquity of God is a ubiquity by virtue of his personal perfec-
SPIRITUALITY OF BEING, 165
tions. The question of an infinite divine essence is for rational
thought an abyss of darkness. It is the question of an infinite
magnitude or extension of essential being. Spatial ideas thus in-
evitably arise, but only for the deeper confusion and helplessness
of thought. But the divine Spirit has no spatial qualities. Hence
there is no place for the question of an infinitely present divine es-
sence.
166 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
CHAPTER II.
GOD IN PERSONALITY.
I. Personality.
The question of personality must be studied first of all and
KNOWLEDGE ^^^^^^7 ^^ ^^^^ light of one's own consciousness. There
OP PERSONAL- is no other way to a knowledge of other personalities,
"^' whether human or angelic, or even the divine. We
have no immediate knowledge of the facts in others which consti-
tute personality. When these facts are known in one's own con-
sciousness, then the personality of others is revealed to him through
a manifestation of the same facts. This is a true mode of knowl-
edge ; and the knowledge is validated by the deepest and most
determining principle of science. The generalizations and con-
structions of science would be groundless if things which manifest
the same qualities were not the same in fact.
Personality is a unity in the deepest sense of the term. The
facts of consciousness are manifold and diverse, but consciousness
itself, the very center of personality, is one. Consciousness and
memor)"-, but memory as a fact of consciousness, reveal to one's self
his personal identity. The unity of personality is in the truth of
personal identity.
With the deepest sense of the unity of mind, its faculties are
open to analysis and classification. Otherwise there
CONSTITUENT .
FACULTIES OF could bc uo mcutal science. Personality, while a unity
PERSONALITY. -^^ itsclf, admlts of scientific treatment because it con-
sists, not in a single principle or j^ower, but in a complex of powers.
Analysis may open this complex and discover its content of powers.
This process is necessary to a clear insight into personality itself,
and the way to a truer view of the divine j)ersonality. The first
thing, then, in the opening of this question is to find the necessary
factg of personality.
1. Determining Facts of Per soiiality. — There are mighty forces
in physical nature; but they can act only on the proper adjustment
or collocation of material things, and thereon must necessarily act.
Their action is without consciousness or aim as well as under a law
of necessity. Such forces, however great in potency or wonderful
PERSONALITY. 167
in operation, can have no quality of personality. Life, Math its
marvelous agency in the vegetable kingdom, still makes no advance
beyond the purely physical realm toward any intrinsic personal
quality.
In the animal orders, notably in those of the higher grades, there
are instinctive imjjulses toward ends, and a voluntary power for
their attainment, but no evidence of other essential requisites of
personality. We cannot study the psychology of animals as we
can that of minds like our own, because we cannot place the facts
of the former in the light of our own consciousness as we can the
facts of the latter. Yet strong instinctive impulses and strong
voluntary power are manifest facts in animal life. But there is no
evidence of such rational intelligence in the conception of ends and
such freedom in the choice of ends as must combine in the consti-
tution of personality.
Pure intellect, intellect without any form of sensibility, however
great, could not constitute personality. Conceptually, personalitv
such an intellect is a possibility, though its sphere of not in purk
knowledge could not be universal. A deeper analysis '^■^'^I''^*=ct.
must find in the sensibilities a necessary element of knowledge in
many spheres. Such a mind might have great intuitive power and
a clear insight into the abstract sciences, but it could have no
interest in their study. Neither could there be for it any eligibil-
ity of ends. For such a mind the mightiest potentiality of will
would be useless for the want of all motive or reason of use. The
only possible action would be purposeless and purely spontaneous.
Personality is intrinsically a free rational agency. This is impos-
sible in pure intellect, however great — impossible even with the
complement of a will potentially very strong.
Eational or moral motives are a necessity to personal agency, and
therefore to personality. Such motives are not mere
-t -J RATIONAL MO-
instinctive impulses toward action, but forms of con- tititv a nk-
scious interest in ends of action, which may be taken *^^^®''^^-
up into reflection and judgment. Motives are possible only with a
capacity for conscious interest in ends. This capacity is broader
and deeper than can well be expressed by the term sensibility. The
profounder motives arise from the rational and moral nature rather
than from what we usually designate as the feelings. There can be
for us no eligibility of ends, and therefore no rational choice, ex-
cept through motives arising in some form of conscious interest in
ends. But rational choice is the central fact of rational agency,
and the only difference between rational agency and jDcrsonal agency
is a difference of verbal expression. With the power of personal
168 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
agency there is personality. It follows that for the constitution
of personality an emotional nature, witli a capacity for rational
interest in ends, must combine witli rational intelligence.
Will is the central power of personal agency, and therefore a
WILL IN PKR- necessary constituent of personality. Without the will
80NALITY. there could be no voluntary use or direction of the men-
tal faculties, no voluntary action of any kind. In such a state man
would be as incapable of personal agency as an animal or even as
any force of physical nature.
The result of the previous analysis is that rational intelligence,
FREE AGENCY scusibility, and will are essential requisites of person-
NEcEssARY. allty. But such a complex of faculties does not in it-
self complete the idea of personality. There must also be the free-
dom of personal agency. Such agency means, not merely the
freedom of external action, but specially the free rational choice of
the ends of action. The freedom of external action requires simply
the freedom of the bodily organism from interior imjiotence and
exterior restraint, and may be as com23lete in an animal as in a
man. The bodily organism is merely instrumental to the external
action, and can be free only as a freely usable instrument. The
mere freedom of external action can have no higher sense. The
true freedom must lie back of this in the personal agency, and must
consist in the power of free rational choice. With this there is
true personality.
There is still a profound question which vitally concerns the
PETERMiNixG rcallty of personality. It is the question of the relation
MOTIVE CON- of motive to choice, or, more properly here, the decision
TO PERSONAL- 0^ ^lic mlud wlth respect to an end — more properly,
"Y- because whether such decision be a choice or not de-
pends upon the relation of the motive to the mental action. That
motive is a necessary condition of choice is a plain truth — so plain
that the maintenance of a liberty of indifference may well seem
strange. Any voluntary decision in a state of indifference must be
a purely arbitrary volition, and therefore cannot be a choice.'
Choice in the very nature of it is the rational election of an end.
For its rationality there must be a motive. But what is the action
of the motive upon the elective decision ? This is the question
which vitally concerns the reality of personality. If the motive is
simply a solicitation or inducement which may be taken up into
reflection and weighed in the judgment, personality is secure. But
if the motive is a causal eflieience whicli determines the decision to
'Kant: MetapJvjsic of Ethics, p. 204^; Aliley: '* The Freedom of Clioice,"J/p<A-
odist Quarterly Rt-viciv, July, 1881.
PERSONALITY. 169
the end, then there is no choice, nor the possibility of one, and
personality sinks with personal agency beneath an absolute law of
determinism.
Only as rational intelligence, sensibility, and will combine in the
constitution of free personal agency is there the reality of person-
ality. There must be rational intelligence for the conception of
ends, sensibility as the source of motives with respect to ends, and
will in combination with intelligence and sensibility as the com-
plement of power in choosing between ends. With these facts
there is j^ersonality. Our own personality is in this complex of
powers.
With moral reason and a capacity for moral motives, motives
sufficient for the choice of the good against the evil, moral per-
there is a moral personality. Conceptually, there sonality.
might be a rational personality without the necessary powers of
a moral personality. These powers might be an original omis-
sion, or the rational might remain after the moral were sunken
beneath a law of necessitation. Moral personality must sink un-
der a moral necessity to evil, just as rational personality must
sink in the want of its essential requisites. There is no deeper
moral necessity, none more exclusive of moral personality, than
an incapacity for the motives necessary to the choice of the
good. For complete moral personality there must be free moral
agency.
2. Requisites of All Personality. — There can be neither human
nor angelic personality, nor even a divine personality, without
this complex of essential requisites. There is no need and no
purpose of asserting a complete parallelism in all personalities.
There is no such implication. As we ascend through the or-
ders of higher intelligences, angels and archangels, even up to
God himself, there may be, and in the divine must be, large va-
riations from such a parallelism. The variations may be not only
in the grade of faculties, reaching to the infinite in the divine,
and particularly in the forms of sensibility, but there may
be other powers, now wholly unknov/n to us. The position is
that the complex of requisites in our own personality is a neces-
sity for all personality. Neither angel nor archangel is or can be
a person in the true, deep sense of the term without these jDowers,
whatever their grade in such higher intelligences, whatever varia-
tion in the forms of sensibility, or whatever other powers they
may j^ossess. The same law of requisites must hold for the divine
personality. But this apjolication must be treated under a distinct
headins".
170 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
II. The Divine Personality.
1. In the Liglit of the Human. — Any conception of the divine per-
sonality irrespective of our own is for us impossible. It does not
follow that our own must be the measure of the divine. We have
previously disclaimed any necessary complete parallelism between
human and angelic j>ersonalities, and pointed out how profoundly
this is true as between our own and the divine. Still there may be
a likeness between the former with its finite powers and the latter
with its infinite perfections which is greatly helpful toward a truer
and clearer notion of the divine. There is a deep truth
soNALiTY THE ^^ ^ur crcation in the image of God.' With the rev-
iMAGK OF THK elatlon of this truth, there is no rashness in looking
DIVINE .
into our own personality for the likeness of the divine.
Nor is it, after a recognition of the difference in the grade of powers
and the forms of sensibility between the two, open to the reprehen-
sion: "■ Thou thoughtest that I was altogether such a one as thyself."'
Personality is the deepest truth of our likeness to God. Our vision
of his personality is in the reflection of his image in our own.'
2. Same Complex of Poivers Requisite. — There must be in God
the three forms of power which constitute j)ersonality in us. In
the lack of any one he could not be a person. Such perfections as
omniscience, omnipotence, and immutability, in however complete
a synthesis, could not of themselves constitute a divine ijersonality.
There must be even for God the eligibility of ends and freedom in
the choice of ends. These are an absolute requirement of personal
agency, which is the central fact of personality. But, as we have
previously seen, the eligibility of ends can arise only with some form
of conscious interest in them. This conscious interest cannot arise
either from pure intelligence or from the will — not even from an
infinite intelligence or an omnipotent will. There must be motiv-
ities of the divine nature, as in distinction from intellect and will
— rational and moral motivities as the necessary ground of interest
in ends. With the powers of intellect, sensibility, and will, and
the freedom of rational and moral self-determination with respect
to ends, there is a divine personality. The question of the divine
freedom will be treated elsewhere.
3. Personality Manifest in Proofs of Theism. — Theism is the
doctrine of a personal God. The arguments for the truth of the-
ism are conclusive of personality in the original cause of the de-
pendent cosmos. A glance at these arguments, as previously given,
' Gen. i, 27. -' Psa. 1, 21.
'Fisher: The Grounds of Thcistic and Chnstian Belief, pp. 1, 2.
THE DIVINE PERSONALITY. 171
will make this manifest. We recur to them in the order of theistic
discussion, not as the facts of personality arise in the method of
psychological treatment.
"We begin with the cosmological argument. On the principle of
causation, with the dependence of cosmical facts, there j^ the cosmo-
is manifest in the existence of the cosmos the power of logical.
will. Only in a self -energizing will is there an adequate cause for
the beginning and ongoing of cosmical formations. This is not in
itself conclusive of personality, but the argument goes so far as to
give us one essential attribute of personality in the original cosmical
cause.
In the teleological argument there is in the formation of the cos-
mos a manifestation at once of both intelligence and ^^ ^he teleo-
sensibility. The adjustments of the cosmos are the logical.
work of intelligence. As these adjustments appear in the har-
mony of the heavens, in the wonders of vegetable and animal or-
ganism, in the formation of man, only an omniscient mind could
have planned them. Thus another essential attribute of personal-
ity in the original cause is given us.
But teleology is not complete in the mere intellectual conception of
ends and the adjustment of means to their attainment. The choice
of ends is an essential element. This choice, essentially rational in
its nature, must be for a reason — for a reason in the sense of mo-
tive. The ends chosen must have possessed a rational eligibility
for the divine mind; for otherwise its whole work in the formation
of the cosmos must have been purely arbitrary. But, as we have
previously shown, the actual eligibility of ends is dependent upon
some form of conscious interest in the electing mind. Such in-
terest is possible neither from pure intellect nor from will, but only
in a subjective motivity combined with those powers in the consti-
tution of personality. This subjective motivity is of the nature of
feeling; and we thus find in God the third essential attribute of
personality.
The anthropological argument for theism proves that a material
genesis of mind is impossible; that God is the only suf- ^^ ^,^^, ^^_
ficient original of mind. The adaptations of mental thropolog-
endowment to our manifold relations and duties, sec-
ular and moral, clearly evince the highest form of divine teleology.
In such teleology there is manifest at once all the essential attri-
butes of divine personality. In the provisions for the happiness of
sentient life, provisions above the mere necessities of existence,
there is the proof of a rational benevolence which must be a per-
sonal quality in the author of such life. In the moral endowments
172 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
of tlie soul there is the proof of a moral nature and a moral agency
in its divine original.' A moral nature, with its agency in the
creation of beings morally constituted, is possible only in a divine
personality.
4. The Sense of Scriidure. — It seems quite needless to carry this
question into the Scriptures. No attempt need be made to cite the
multitude of texts expressive of personal attributes in God. Little
more is required than to note and emphasize the fact
TKSTIMONY OF ^ ^
THE SCRIPT- that from beginning to end, without the slightest halt-
'^'^^'^" ing or variation, the Scriptures utter the one great
truth of the divine personality. The theistic conception of patri-
archs, prophets, and apostles is ever the conception of a personal
God. The personal divine Son is the revelation of the personal
divine Father. In the sublime words which open the Scriptures —
" In the beginning God created, the heaven and the earth '' — there
is the profound truth of a personal God, eternally before the be-
ginning. In the giving of the law, notably in the contents of the
ten commandments, the same deep truth is manifest. The Lord's
Prayer is replete with the truth of the divine personality. We
breathe its petitions to the Father in heaven, devoutly recognize
his will, pray for the daily ministries of his providence, for his
gracious forgiveness and heavenly guidance. This prayer is useless
and without meaning for any one who does not believe in a personal
God.
If the texts which openly express or clearly imply the sense of
divine personality were properly classified, they would
ALL THE I'OW- '^ r^ .
ERs OF PKK- be found ascribing to God the three forms of attribute
soNALiT\. which constitute personality. There is first the ascrip-
tion of intelligence or omniscience.'' Again, there is the ascrip-
tion of feeling or affection. The Lord loves righteousness and
hates iniquity. He is pitiful and of tender mercy.' One great
fact might well sufiice for the present truth. The great redemp-
tion originated in the divine love.^ In this love there is an infinite
fullness of feeling. " God is love." * This is the deepest truth of
God; and it is the truth of an emotional nature. This does not
imply the excessive or passionate forms of emotion as in ourselves,
but it does mean the reality of affections in God. Finally, there is
ascribed to God the attribute of will as the power of personal
agency." Thus distinctly and definitely the Scriptures ascribe to
' Mansel : Limits of Religious Thought, p. 122.
' Psa. cxlvii, 5 ; Prov. xv, 3 ; Acts xv, 18 ; Heb. iv, 13.
'Psa. xxxiii, 5; xlv, 7; Jas. v, 11. ■'John iii, 16; IJohn iv, 10.
' 1 John iv, 16. * Psa. cxv, 3 ; Isa. xlvi, 10 ; Dan. iv, 35 ; Matt, xix, 26.
THE DIVINE PERSONALITY. 173
God the three attributes, intelligence, feeling, will, which consti-
tute personality.
5. God Only in Personality. — If God is not a personal being, the
result must be either atheism or pantheism. It matters little
which. The dark and deadly implications are much the same.
There is no God with self-consciousness or the power of rational
and moral self-determination, no personal divine agency in the uni-
verse. A blind, necessitated force is the original of all. The ex-
istence of the world and the heavens is without reason or end.
There is no reason for the existence of man, no rational or moral
end. God has no interest in him, no rational or moral rule over
him. The universal sense of moral obligation and responsibility
must be pronounced a delusion. There should be an end of wor-
ship, for there is wanting a truly worshipful being. All that re-
mains is the dark picture of a universe without divine teleology or
providence. *
'Hamilton: Autology, party; Strong: Systematic Theology, pp. 121, 123;
Harris : Philosophical Basis of Theism, pp. 98, 99 ; The Self- Revelation of God,
part iii ; Olssen : Personality, Hum,an and Divine,
174 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
CHAPTER III.
GOD IN ATTRIBUTES.
We have previously given the definite sense of attribute, the dis-
tinction of attribute and essential being, and the immanence of
attribute in being. In treating the question of divine personality
we unavoidably anticipated the divine attributes. But they were
then brought into notice only incidentally, and only so far as that
discussion required, and their proper treatment we still have on
hand. This discussion should proceed on a scientific analysis and
classification, A neglect of this method allows various divine pred-
i cables to be classed and treated as attributes which are not dis-
tinctively such. There are many instances of this error. These
divine verities should not be omitted, but we should avoid the ar-
tificial method of classing them as attributes, and should treat
them separately.
I. Classification" of the Attributes.
1. Meiliod of Classification. — There are peculiarities in the clas-
sification of the attributes, as compared with the classifications in
the sciences of nature, which should not be overlooked. In these
sciences the classifications are made under terms which express
general conceptions, not realities of existence. Such are the
terms mollusca, vertebrata, mammalia, ruminantia. The attributes
have no such a conceptual ground. God as their subject is the
deepest reality of existence. It was an egregious error of Mill to
assert the contrary: " God is as much a general term to the Chris-
tian or Jew as to the polytheist."^ With the polytheist to whom
there are many gods the term might express a general conception,
but with the Christian or Jew, to whom there is only one God, it
cannot have such a sense. If this term expressed a mere concep-
tion or general notion, no ground would remain for the attributes
as concrete realities in the divine personality. But God is a per-
sonal term, with the definite and concrete sense of a proper term.
As the subject of the attributes he is the infinite reality of being.
In this fact lies one peculiarity in the classification of the attributes
as compared with the classifications in the sciences of nature.
' Logic, p. 94.
CLASSIFICATION OF THE ATTRIBUTES. 175
There is another peculiarity of this classification. Under the
common terms or general conceptions, as above stated, the things
classed are essential, individual existences; whereas the attributes
are neither essential nor individual existences, but are concrete
realities of the divine personality.
With these profound differences, we may still observe a scientific
method in the treatment of the divine attributes. Such the method
a method requires their classification on the ground of scientific.
what is the deepest in God as their subject. This law must exclude
all predicables which, however true of God, are not distinctively
attributes. It follows that a catalogue of divine predicables, how-
ever complete and true, is not a classification of the divine attri-
butes. Nor is any division on grounds which do not thoroughly
differentiate the several groups a proper classification. A neglect
of these principles results in artificial distinctions — of which there
are many instances.
2. Artificial Classifications. — It will help us to a clearer view of
the question if we notice a few instances of such artificial distinc-
tions and groupings.
Such is the division of the attributes into the natural and the
moral. Instances of the kind are so common that it is ^ig natural
needless to give any special reference. It might be ^^^ moral.
proper to distinguish the spheres of the divine agency into the nat-
ural and the moral, but such a distinction of the attributes is
groundless. God acts in the physical and moral spheres, but not
by two distinct sets of poVers. Such a distinction in the spheres
of his operation cannot be carried back into the powers of his
agency.
A grouping of the attributes as positive and negative is equally
artificial. It is artificial because this distinction in the
AS positive
terms marks no real distinction in the attributes. The and nega-
negative terms have just as positive a sense as the class ^'^^'
of positive terms. Infinity and immutability express the reality of
the limitless and changeless in God just as omniscience and omnip-
otence express the absolute plenitude of his knowledge and power.
It thus ai3pears that there is no ground for this classification of the
attributes. It is a grouping without any real distinction. It will
further appear that the divine predicables which we express nega-
tively are not distinctively attributes.
There is no scientific advance on the ground of a distinction be-
tween what God is in himself and in his manifestations: "the Maj-
esty which he has in himself, and the glory which he outiuardly
manifests ; the inner brightness, consequently, and the outward
176 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
radiance of the light ; the attributes which rehite to his mode of
existence, and those which become known to us in his
GLORY AND ^"of/g of Operation."'^ There is no ground for such a
OUTER MANi- distinctiou. In any proper sense in which some attri-
butes are related to the mode of the divine existence all
must be so rehited. Hence they cannot be thus divided into distinct
classes. Further, all are eternally complete in God ; hence no
manifestation of a part in the mode of his operation can constitute
a ground of classification.
Dr. Hodge accepts the classification of the Westminster Cate-
chism. He thinks that, while open to speculative objection, it has
the advantage of simplicity and familiarity." He does not commend
it, as certainly he could not, for any exact analysis or scientific
construction. HoAvever complete as a catalogue, it is not in any
strict sense a classification.
We may present together two instances of analysis and classifica-
BY POPE AND tion which, with verbal differences, are substantially the
COCKER. same. Dr. Pope gives, as the result of his analysis,
''First, the attributes pertaining to God as absolute or unrelated
being ; then, those arising out of the relation between the Supreme
and the creature, which indeed require the creature for their man-
ifestation ; and, finally, those which belong to the relation between
God and moral beings under his government, with special reference
to man."' Dr. Cocker gives the result of his analysis and the
grounds of his classification thus : ''^ 1. As related to our intuition of
real being ; by abstraction from all other being or personality — the
immanent attributes of God. 2. As causally related to finite, de-
pendent existence ; by elimination of all necessary limitation — the
relative or transitive attributes of God. 3. As ethically related
to finite personality ; by elimination of all imperfection — tlie moral
attributes of God. " ' It will readily appear, on a comparison of
these two instances, that the three divisions of the one are the same
in principle and method as the three divisions of the other. They
are both specially formal endeavors toward a scientific attainment.
We must think tlie method a mistake and the aim a failure. In
the grouping of the attributes according to the three divisions, cer-
tain divine predicables are placed in the first which are not dis-
tinctively attributes. We may instance spirituality , which is of the
very essence of God and not an attribute of his being; eternity, which
'Van Oosterzee: Chnstian Dogmatics, vol. i, p. 254.
' Systematic Theology, vol. i, p. 376.
' Christian Theology, vol. i, p. 291.
* Theistie Conception of the World, p. 50.
CLASSIFICATION OF THE ATTRIBUTES. 177
is in no proper sense an attribute of the absolute being of God, and
no truer of his absolute being than of his personal attributes which
are grouped in the second and third divisions ; immutability , which
is not distinctively a truth of the essential being of God, as it is
equally true of all his attributes ; self-snfficiencij, which, instead of
being a distinct truth of the very essence of God, can be a reality
only with his omniscience and omnipotence. In the second and
third groupings, on a distinction of relations to the creature and to
moral beings, with a resulting distinction of attributes as the tran-
sitive and the moral, it was impossible to complete the second divis-
ion without placing in it some attributes which are necessary to
the third — impossible, because that distinction is scientifically in-
sufficient for the separate groupings. Omniscience, omnipotence,
wisdom, goodness, which could not be omitted from the relation of
God to the creature, are equally necessary in his relation to moral
government. The insufficiency of these distinctions may be fur-
ther noted, particularly in the analysis of Cocker. The transitive
attributes of his second division are as immanent in God as the
attributes of the first, and no more transitive than those of the
third. In both instances, the distinction between the second and
third divisions is really the same as that, previously noticed, be-
tween the natural and moral attributes, and is open to the same
insuperable objections.
It was not our purpose to review comprehensively the many meth-
ods in the classification of the attributes, but to notice
. PURPOSE OF
a few instances as illustrative of an artificial method. these i.n-
What we have given may suffice for this purpose. stances.
3. Classification on the Ground of Personality. — In the true
method of science classification is on the ground of what is most
determinate in the subject. This is the natural method in dis-
tinction froHT the artificial. The same method should be observed
in the classification of the divine attributes. Personal- personality
ity is the most determinate conception of God, and the the t r v e
truest, deepest sense in which he can be viewed as the classifica-
subject of his own attributes. Personality is the only tion.
conception of God which immediately gives his attributes. Any
other ground of classification must result either in a mere catalogue
in which subject and attribute are confusedly jumbled, or in group-
ings without any sufficient ground of distinction. Personality
gives all attributes which are properly such in distinction from
what God is as their subject. This will appear on their direct treat-
ment, while the attributes themselves will thus open into a clear-
ness of view not otherwise attainable.
178 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
4. Category of the Attributes. — Our method omits from this cat-
egory certain divine predicables usually classed as attributes. Of
these there are several classes. Some belong to God as subject, not
as attributes. Some, however true of God, are in no proper sense
his attributes. Others result from the perfection of attributes, but
are not distinctively attributes themselves. We have previously
noted spirituality as belonging to the first class. Eternity and
unity belong to the second. Immutability and omnipresence be-
long to the third. For the present it may suffice thus to name the
several classes, as all must bo treated in the proper place. It may
be further stated that one attribute, as we shall find the category,
includes what are usually treated as several attributes.
As God in personality is the subject of his own attributes, so
therein we must find their true category. This cat-
T H K T R I* K o »/
cATKaoRY i.\ egory must be determined by the constitutive and essen-
pERsoNALAT- i{^\ f^cts of thc divluc personality. These essential
TRIBUTES. - T . ., „,T . ,
facts are the divme attributes. There are no single
terms for their complete expression, and the best will require
explication. The requirement is specially from the perfection
of the powers which constitute the divine attributes. The terms
which express these powers in the human personality require ex-
plication ; and the requirement must be far deeper in their use for
the divine attributes. A proper analj'sis gives us the essential
powers of the human personality as intellect, sensibility, and will.
For the present we shall use the same terms for the designation
of the constitutive powers of the divine personality. "We said for
the present, because these terms must be left open for such modifi-
cation or substitution as may be required by the plenitude and
perfection of these powers in the divine personality.
Intellect is in both common and philosophic use for the power
INTELLECT, OM- ^r capaclty of rational intelligence in the human mind.
NisciKNCE. It includes all the cognitive faculties, but signifies
simply the capacity for knowledge, while knowledge itself must be
an acquisition through their proper use. There is the reality of
intellect in God ; and, so far, there is a likeness of powers in the
human and the divine personalities. Knowledge in God, however,
is not an acquisition, but an eternal possession. This profound
distinction requires the use of another term for the expression of
the whole truth in God. Intellect well expresses the power of knowl-
edge in the human mind, but cannot express the plenitude of the
reality in the divine mind. No term is more appropriate than
omniscience — the one long in theological use. Omniscience implies
the profoundest sense of intellect as a power of knowledge, but
CLASSIFICATION OF THE. ATTIUnUTES. 179
omits all implication of a process of acquisition, while it expresses
the infinite plenitude of the divine knowledge.
tSensibility is the term in philosophic use for all forms of mental
feeliiiff. It is also used without any qualification for
" . . -^ ^ . SENSIBILITY,
all forms of divine feeling. It seems more approj^riate divink sk\-
for a philosophy grounded in sensationalism than for a '^"""ty.
philosophy which gives a proper place to the higher rational powers
and to original truths. The profoundest motives of life arise with
the activities of the philosophic and moral reason. Sensibility
seems but a poor term for the expression of these higher motivities.
Yet it is the term in i)hilosophic use ; nor have we another with
which to replace it. It seems still more inappropriate and insuf-
ficient for the expression of the forms of feeling in the mind of God,
and necessary to his personality. But the difficulty of replacing it
with a better still remains. The term feeling is deficient in def-
initeness, and includes much of human sensibility which can have
nothing analogous in the divine consciousness. Affection and
emotion are in philosophic use for distinct forms of sensibility,
and hence are respectively too specific and narrow for the present
requirement. Even love, while the deepest truth of the divine
nature, does not include all the forms of divine feeling. It seems
necessary still to use the term sensibility. But we here use it only
in the sense of the higher forms of feeling, particularly the rational
and moral, which render man the image of God. These feelings
are the response of his motivities to the objects of his conception,
and constitute the motives of his providence. Without such
motives he could have no reason for any action. Neither teleology,
nor justice, nor love could have any place in the operations of his
providence. There could be no divine providence. Neither could
there be a divine personality.
Will is the third and completing attribute of personality. It is
the necessary power of personal agency, of rational self- ^i^l, om-
determination, of rational action with respect to mo- nipotknce.
tives and ends. The will is not sufficient for personality simply as
a power of self -energizing for the attainment of the ends of one's
impulses and appetences. Such a power is no higher than the self-
energizing of an animal. It must be central to the personality,
that it may be the working-power of the rational personal agency.
It is thus the power of election with respect to ends, and the exec-
utive power whereby one may give effect to his choices. The will
is thus a necessary attribute of personality. It is such an attribute
in God. The truth of such a divine attribute is in the Scriptures,
and in the reality of the divine personality. The power of personal
180 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
agency in God, whether in creation, providence, or grace, is the
power of his will. It has the plenitude of omnipotence. Hence
will and omnipotence in God are the same attribute. For this rea-
son "we may properly use the term omnipotence.
II. DivixE Omniscience.
As previously noted, we use the term omniscience instead of
either intelligence or intellect for the reason that knowledge in
God is immediate and infinite. The reality of intellect is given
with his personality, while omniscience expresses the plenitude of
its perfection. .Such perfection is the real question in the treat-
ment of this attribute.
1. Sense of Omniscience. — In the measure of agreement between
the mental concept and the object of conception there is knowl-
edge, in whatever mind. The fact is the same whatever the mode
of the conception or the extent of the knowledge. Omniscience
must be God's perfect conception of himself, and of all things and
events, without respect to the time of their existence or occurrence.
Any limitation in any particular must be a limitation in the divine
knowledge.
Omniscience must be an immediate and eternal knowing. The
AN iMMEniATE ^uowledgc wlilch is not immediate and eternal must be
AND KTKHNAL au acquisitiou. For the acquisition there must be time
KNOWING. ^^^ ^ mental process. Such knowledge must be lim-
ited. An acquired omniscience is not a thinkable possibility. The
ideas are. too alien for any scientific association in rational thought.
Hence we must either admit an immediate and eternal knowing in
God or deny his omniscience. These alternatives are complete and
absolute.
Omniscience, in the truest, deepest sense of the term, must be
prescient of all futuritions, whatever their nature or causality.
Future free volitions must be included with events which shall
arise from necessary causes. Only with such prescience can there
be a true omniscience. Such a divine omniscience is the common
Christian faith. There are exceptions; and the issue raised should
not be entirely omitted.
2. Respecting Future Free Volitions. — The divine nescience of
future free volitions as now maintained is, apparently, quite differ-
ent from the doctrine of Adam Clarke, who held on the part of
God a purely voluntary nescience. The difference, however, is
THK DOCTRINE Tatlior apparcut than real. The doctrine of Clarke
ov CLARKE. must assume for God simply a faculty of knowledge,
potentially existent in him and for his voluntary use, in analogy to
DIVINE OMNISCIENCE. 181
his power. He did recognize this analogy, but plainly without ap-
prehending its implication respecting the mode of the divine knowl-
edge. A faculty of knowledge for voluntary use is simply a faculty
for the acquisition of knowledge. An immediate and eternal
knowing is thus precluded. But, as previously noted, such acquisi-
tion requires time and a mental process. Further, there must be
the conditions necessary to the mental process. Such conditions
might exist in relation to all necessary futuritions, as a knowledge
of them might be reached through their necessitating causes, but
no such conditions could exist in relation to future free volitions.
The divine nescience of such volitions would, therefore, be a neces-
sity, not a free choice. The outcome is thus contradictory to the
doctrine of the divine nescience which Clarke maintained. With
this result, we scarcely need add the usual adverse criticism, that a
voluntary nescience in God must imply a knowledge of the things
which he chooses not to know.
The doctrine now specially maintained denies the possibility of a
divine prescience of future free volitions. Thus the
J- . PRESENT DOC-
same ground is here openly asserted which we found trine of nes-
as an implication of the doctrine previously noticed, •^'*'^*^^-
but as contradictory to the particular form in which it was main-
tained. In addition to this deeper ground on which a doctrine of
nescience is maintained, various other arguments are adduced as
corroborative of the doctrine. Some of these arguments we shall
briefly notice, though our chief aim is to analyze the doctrine and
set it in a clear light.
The doctrine itself is not entirely new. Along the Christian
centuries it occasionally appears in theological speculation. The
earlier Socinianism openly avowed it. Some of the Eemonstrants
held the same view, though it does not appear with Arminius him-
self. The principle must be in the Calvinism which grounds the
prescience of God in his decrees and denies the con- treatment by
tingency of foreknown events. But the doctrine itself m<cabe.
has more recently been treated with a definiteness and thorough-
ness and supported with a force of argument which are quite new.'
It is much easier to pronounce the arguments of Dr. McCabe a
nullity than to answer them in a process of lucid and conclusive
logic. Divine omniscience, with prescience of future free volitions,
however sure as a truth of Scripture, has real difficulty for rational
thought. We need but instance the relation of the question to the
freedom of choice. Some deny omniscience as contradictory to
'McCabe: The Foreknoivledge of God; Divine Nescience of Future Contiti'
gencies.
182 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
freedom. Some deny freedom as contradictory to omniscience.
Many, while holding l)otii, regard tlieir reconciliation as above the
j)ovver of human thought. But tais is only one of many facts
which seriously perplex the question.
Whatever the perplexities which may arise with the doctrine of
omniscience, thev must be as real respecting the futuri-
K. K S I* K ( ' T I \ (3 *'
i-cTiiKiTioNs tions of the divine agency as of the human. Indeed,
OK TiiK I) I- there are difficulties which more directly concern the
divine agency. It might be said that God freely pre-
determines his own future volitions, and therefore may foreknow
them in entire consistency with their freedom. This, however, can
relieve no difficulty of the question — indeed, simply avoids the real
question. Such future volitions must be purely executive for the
attainment of previously chosen ends. In the mind of God they
must be subject to his predetermination, and therefore cannot stand
in the attitude of future free choices. If future free volitions are
unknowable because free, or unknowable for any other reason, then
such volitions of God arc as completely beyond the reach of his pre-
science as the future free volitions of men. If he cannot foreknow
our free volitions, neither can he foreknow his own, which, in a
wise dealing with us, must, in many instances, be shaped in adjust-
ment to such as we put forth.
Whether the divine foreknowledge is consistent with the freedom
of choice is a question which may be more appropriately treated in
another place.
It is strongly urged against the doctrine of prescience that God
deals with men, particularly with the wicked, in the
AND GOD'S use of means for their salvation, just as though he
DEALINGS (Ji(j not foreknow their decisive moral choices. This
statement is, at least, apparently true. That is, there
would be no apparent reason for a change of procedure if God did
not foreknow the final moral choices of men. Is such a procedure
so contradictory to the doctrine of prescience that both cannot be
true? If this be the case, omniscience would disqualify God for
the administration of a moral government over the human race.
The only apparent alternative would be a divine allotment of final
destinies on the foresight of what would be the decisive moral
choices of men if placed in a probationary life. Such a doctrine of
the divine procedure actually appears in theological speculation.
In the many attempts to solve the perplexing dogma of Adamic sin
as the common penal desert of the race, the position has been taken
that God, foreknowing that every man, if placed in the same state
as Adam, would sin just as he did, might justly and did actually
DIVINE OMNISCIENCE. 183
account the same sin to every man. Of course tliis doctrine can
have no place in a true theology. Nor can it be true that omnis-
cience would disqualify God for the administration of a moral gov-
ernmeat. If we were under a law of necessity, the divine use of
means for our salvation would be without reason. This is mani-
festly true i]i the case of uecessitation to evil. That we are free
and srJvable renders the use of means consistent with the divine
prescience. Otherwice the total omission of means of salvation
v.'oidd be justified in all cases of a foreknown final sinful choice.
Such an omission could not be reconciled with the requirements of
a divine moral government. With the truth of i^rescience, God
may consistently, and must in fatherly rule and love, deal with us
in the use of means for our salvation just as though he did not
foreknow our final moral choices.'
It is objected that the creation of souls with prescience of a sin-
ful life and a final penal doom is irreconcilable with
the goodness of God. This is a weighty objection — so ^qvls with
weighty that we might well prefer the doctrine of nes- prescience of
cience if it could obviate the difficulties which beset
the question of sin. But this it cannot achieve. Insoluble per-
plexities would still remain. The creation of souls for the moral
responsibility of free personalities must be with the known possi-
bility of a final sinful choice and penal doom. This is a fact which
our reason cannot fully adjust to the goodness of God, and a fact
which remains in all its force with the nescience of future free
vojitions. Further, even with the nescience of future choices, we
must a^lmit the divine knowledge of all actual choices, and there-
fore the knowledge that, up to the present time, many through the
choice of evil have incurred the penal doom of sin. Yet, with this
knowledge, and with the forecast of such results in the future, God
still perpetuates the race. The difficulty in this case seems quite
as inexplicable for our reason as that which arises with the doctrine
of the divine prescience. The real difficulty is the existence of
moml evil under the government of God. This still remains with
the doctrine of nescience.
An argument against the prescience of future free volitions is
brought from their present nihility. Such volitions are
AFTTTTTRE
nothing until their actuality, and therefore cannot be choice an un-
the object of any previous knowledge. The validity of know able
ji • , • , 1 ,■ AT -J? NOTHING.
this argument is not above question. Moreover, ii
properly analyzed, its implications must be found of very difficult
adjustment to the realities of the divine knowledge. A future
' Bledsoe : Theodicy, pp. 241, 243.
184 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
eclipse is as much a present nihility as a future free choice. What
then is the difference between the two as it respects the divine pre-
science? The answer is obvious. For the former there is a neces-
sitating cause; for the latter^, a free cause. This is the only differ-
ence. Hence the implication of this argument is that the divine
foreknowledge of any futurition is conditioned on a j^resent knowl-
edge of its necessitating cause. It follows that God foreknows- an
eclipse just as an astronomer foreknows it. His knowledge may be
more ready and perfect, but cannot be other in its mode. Thus
the divine knowledge is conditioned and must be an acquisition
through a mental process. These facts cannot be adjusted to the
perfection and plenitude of the divine knowledge as clearly revealed
in the Scriptures.
Further, a present free choice is in itself a purely metaphysical
fact, and, even with complete ethical quality, may be without any
cognizable sign. Hence it may be rationally questioned whether a
mind incapable of foreknowing a future free choice could know a
present free choice in its pure metaphysical self. On the other
hand, if it be true, as the Scriptures so fully declare, tliat the divine
mind is ever cognizant of the most central and secret facts of the
human mind, we may rationally think its vision so immediate and
absolute as clearly to foresee our future free choices.
The most difficult question of omniscience concerns its relation to
the divine personality. This, however, must go forward
IMPLICATIONS , •Lie-i.i.i.j.c^o
OF THK DOC- to a more appropruite place tor its treatment. So tar
TRINE OF NF.S- yfQ h^vc SDCcially aimed to place the doctrine of nescience
CIENCK. . , ,. 1 /..,..
m tlie light of its implications respecting the divme
knowledge. We think these implications irreconcilable with the
plenitude of this knowledge as it is clearly revealed in the Script
ures, and as it must be in the truth of theism. We have not treated
the question of nescience with any profound apprehension for the
truth. Its doctrinal and practical bearing may easily be overesti-
mated. The divine nescience of future free volitions, if accepted
as a truth, is not necessarily revolutionary in theology. The "Cal-
vinism which grounds foreknowledge in the divine decrees would
remain the same. It can freely admit the divine nescience of future
volitions as pure contingencies. This position it already occupies.
But for it there are no such future volitions. The long-time debate
on the question of freedom would still be on hand, and it would be
necessary to carry this question convincingly against Calvinism be-
fore the doctrine of nescience could disturb its foundations. Nor
would this doctrine be any more revolutionary in the system of
Arminianism. Every vital doctrine would remain just the same.
DIVINE OMNISCIENCE. 185
The chief perceivable result would be to free the system from the
perplexity for freedom which arises with the divine prescience.
The very serious difficulty in the attainment of this result is
that we require the reality of freedom as the necessary ground of
the doctrine of nescience. Only through the proved reality of the
former can we reach the truth of the latter. This is their logical
-and irreversible order. If the truth of nescience were established or
accepted, it would be as little revolutionary within the sphere of
practical truth as in that of doctrinal truth. Certainly it could not
in the least abate any of the moral forces of Christianity. Grod
would still be immediately and perfectly cognizant of all the actual-
ities of our moral life. Our responsibility would be Just the same;
all divine promises and penalties tiie very same. '
3. Trutli of Omniscience. — There is for us no direct or complete
knowledge of omniscience. We can no more fully grasp it in thought
than we can grasp the omnipotence of the divine will or the infin-
itude of the divine love. If there be such a reality, only omnis-
cience itself can absolutely know it. We may listen to the united
utterances of nature and revelation and receive the great truth in
faith, but cannot receive it in a comprehensive knowledge.
In the fitness of materiale lements for cosmical uses, in the mani-
fold and marvelous adjustments of nature, in the sim- testimony of
plicity and far-reaching sway of the laws of nature, in the scripture.
wonders of organic life, in the realm of rational intelligences there
are manifestations of a mind which Ave must rationally think om-
niscient. These thoughts are in accord v/ith the utterances of
Scripture. " 0 Lord, how manifold are thy workc! in wisdom hast
thou made them all."'^ "The Lord by wisdom hath founded the
earth; by understanding he hath established the heavens.'"
There are more explicit words of kScripture respecting the infinite
plenitude of the divine knowledge. Even in special moke explicit
applications the expression of the knowledge is so com- words.
plete that its infinite comprehension is an inevitable implication.
" 0 Lord, thou hast searched me, and known me. Thou knowest
my downsitting and mine uprising; thou understandest my thoughts
afar off. Thou compassest my path and my lying down, and art
acquainted with all my ways. For there is not a word in my tongue,
but, lo, 0 Lord, thou knowest it altogether. Thou hast beset me
behind and before, and laid thine hand upon me. Such knowledge
is too wonderful for me; it is high, I cannot attain unto it. Whither
' Martensen : Christian Dogmatics, p. 219 ; Dorner : Christian Doctrine, vol. i,
p. 336.
'■' Psa. civ, 24. ' ^ Prov. iii, 19.
186 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
shall I go ^-om thy Spirit? or whither shall I flee from thy presence?
If I ascend up into heaven, thou art there: if I make my bed in liell,
behold, thou art there. If I take the wings of the morning, and
dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea; even there shall thy hand
lead me, and thy right hand shall hold me. If I say, Surely the
darkness shall cover me; even the night shall be light about me.
Yea, the darkness hideth not from thee ; but the night shineth as
the day: the darkness and the light are both alike to thee." ' This
passage is so replete with the deepest truth of the divine knowledge
that we may well cite it in full. There is nothing in the life of
man, nothing in his deeds or words, nothing in his most secret
thoughts and feelings which is not perfectly known to God. This is
the truth respecting all the multitudes of the race. Only an im-
mediate and absolute knowing is equal to such knowledge. Neither
height nor depth nor distance can imj^ose any limitation. For it
the night is as the day, the darkness as the light
We may add a few texts : " Great is our Lord, and of great
Ki-RTHKii TEs- powcr: his understanding is infinite."" "The eyes of
TiMDNY. the Lord are in every place, beholding the evil and the
good." ' The truth of each of these texts is the truth of the other.
If God's understanding is infinite, he must every-where behold the
evil and the good. If he every-where beholds the evil and the good,
his understanding must be infinite. " Neither is there any creature
that is not manifest in his sight: but all things are naked and opened
unto the eyes of him with whom we have to do."^ The divine
knowledge is beforehand with the future. " Behold, the former
things are come to pass, and nev/ things do I declare : before they
spring forth I tell you of them."" These texts reveal the infinite
plenitude of the divine knowledge. In the sense of the former, all
things, in the fullest sense of all, are in the open vision of God.
The connection shows the inclusion of the most central and secret
life of all men. The latter text brings the future with the past into
the comprehension of the same knowledge.
It might be objected that all the texts which we have cited in
proof of omniscience, with one exception, reveal simply
situ KNowL- ^ , . ' r ' 1 J
nxiK (iKAsps the divine knowledge of the present, the truth of which
TiiK FUTi UE. ^^ theist questions. It might further be said tluit the
one text which embraces the future may not include free choices,
but only such futuritions as shall arise from predetermining causal-
ities. If all this should be conceded, the proof of omniscience must
still lie in these texts. The plenitude and the mode of the divine
' Psa. cxxxix, 1-12. '^ Psa. cxlvii, 5. ' Prov. xv, 3.
* Heb. iv, 13. * Isa. xlii, 9.
DIVINE OMNISCIENCE. 187
knowledge which they reveal warrant the inference of omniscience
in the truest, deepest sense of the term. We need not dwell upon
the extent of the universe which, in all its magnitudes and minutiae,
even to every atom, is perfectly known to God. Nor need we
specially speak of higher intelligences, with lives rej)lete with the
deepest intensities of thought and feeling and action, all which are
comprehended in the divine knowledge. Suffice, that God knows
what is in man; all that is in man; all that is in all men. This is
what the Scriptures declare, and what no theist can question. The
knowledge is perfect. It embraces all the interior activities, all the
springs of action, all the impulses and aims of every life. The
knowledge is so complete that God can perfectly adjust his minis-
tries to the exigencies of every life; so complete that he can finally
be the perfectly righteous Judge of each life. Such knowledge
must be immediate and absolute in its mode. Its plenitude can
admit no process of acquisition, no conditions of space or time.
The future, even in its ethical volitions, must be open to the vision
of such absolute knowledge.
The prophecies cannot be interpreted without the divine presci-
ence of morally free and responsible volitions in men.
■^ . -^ . PRESCIENCE IN
We speak of the prophecies generally. Even if some the puophe-
could be interpreted on deterministic ground, the many ^"'^'
require freedom in the responsible human agency so widely operative
in their fulfillment. We need not enter into details or into the cita-
tion and unfolding of particular prophecies. A general view may
suffice. Prophecy began its utterances in the earliest history of the
race, and continued to multiply them through all the progress of
revelation, while the times of their application still stretched far
down the centuries, even unto the final consummation. In a gen-
eral way, we may instance the Jews and neighboring nations —
Egypt, Nineveh, Babylon, Tyre — as the subjects of prophecy. Not
only are their future fortunes severally sketched in bold outline,
but the reason of their fortunes is given specifically in their own
moral conduct. The various forms of vice and crime are depicted
in their incipiency, progress, and repletion, as the prelude and
provocation of the providential doom which successively befell them.
These prophecies, so specific in facts, and often long antedating the
fulfilling events, could not have been uttared and verified by the
I'esult without the divine prescience of the morally responsible con-
duct of these people severally and individually. This is the presci-
ence of free choices.
The Messianic prophecies should receive a separate notice in their
relation to this question. Students of these prophecies find in
188 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
them much of the life of Christ as it is given in the gospels. More-
8PECI iL- • o^'sr, the responsible conduct of others respecting him is
THEMKssiANic cquully forctolcl. The rejection and persecution which
pRopHhciKs,. j^^ should suffer from his own people; the heinous offense
of his betrayal by Judas and his denial by Peter; his crucifixion,
with singular detail of particulars in the cruel treatment which he
Bhould suffer, and the fearful sin of the authors of these cruelties — all
this is in these prophecies. They equally disclose the providential
doom of this i^eople for the willful and wicked rejection of the
Christ. IIow could all this be without the divine prescience of the
free and responsible action of men? These prophecies were not the
utterance of a mere judgment of the future in view of the drift of
the present, but divine predictions of clearly foreseen events, in the
production of whicli the free and responsible agency of men should
be efficiently operative. Prophecy in its fulfillment seems conclusive
of the divine prescience of free, ethical volitions.
4. DistinclioHS of Divine Knoivledge. — There are certain dis-
tinctions in the knowledge of God which may be helpful toward
an adjustment of omniscience to his personal agency. The origi-
nality of these distinctions is accorded to Fonseca and Molina,
Spanish theologians of the Jesuit order. Naturally, they were
formulated in the technical manner common at the time: scientia
Dei necessaria ; scientia Dei libera ; scientia Dei media. Doruer
gives a very full and clear statement of these distinctions.' Dr.
Hodge also gives a clear statement, particularly of the third —
ftcieiitia Dei media — from which, however, his stanch Calvinism
dissents." A summary statement in simpler terms may render
these distinctions clearer.
God's knowledge of himself is necessary and eternal. This is an
SCIENTIA DEI iucvitable implication of his eternal personal existence.
^''"•^^'^'^''^- Personality is unreal without self-consciousness, which
must include self-knowledge. The infinite perfection of the di-
vine mind must imply the absolute plenitude of self-knowledge.
In the perfection of this knowledge God must know his own po-
tentialities, and therefore all possibilities with respect to his own
immediate agency. Further, all rational and ethical truths which,
with the personality of God, must be eternal realities, may prop-
erly be jilaced in the content of his necessary knowledge. There
is thus a sphere of necessary knowledge, which is intrinsic to the
divine j)crsonality.
But as the universe is the creation of (Jod on his own free
' Christian Doctrine, vol. i, pp. 325-328.
' Systematic Tlieoloyy, vol, i, pp. 398-400.
DIVINE OMNISCIENCE. 189
choice,' a knowledge of it cannot be included in his necessary self-
knowledge. The fact is the same even with an eternal scientia dki
prescience of his creative work. It is still the work of libera.
his free agency, and therefore need not have been. In this case it
could have been an object of knowledge only as a j)ossibility, which
belongs to the distinction of necessary knowledge. It follows that
God's knowledge of the universe, whether as a purposed futurition
or an effectuated reality, is conditioned on his own free agency,
and may jDroperly be designated scientia Dei libera — a knowledge
within his own joower or dependent upon himself.
In the reality of our free moral agency, God must adjust the
ministries of his government to the manner of our con- scientia dei
duct as arising from our freedom. There is nothing media.
surer than this. To deny it is to deny the reality of our own free
agency. With freedom, human conduct is often other than it
might have been. One man is bad who might have been good, and
another good who might have been bad. The divine dealings with
each must, as wise and good, be shaj)ed according to his conduct,
and would be different with a difference of conduct. In all such
cases God's prescience of his own agency is conditioned on the fore-
seen free action of men. There is this logical mediation even with
immediateness in the mode of the divine knowledge. Scientia Del
media is therefore no erroneous or misleading formula."
5. Omniscience and Divine Personality. — The scientific adjust-
ment of omniscience to the divine personality and personal agency
is no easy attainment. The real difficulty has not re-
. ■' . . -^ REAL DIFFI-
ceived its proper recognition. It should not be over- culty ov the
looked, even if without solution in our reason. The '^^'^s'^'O'^-
discussion respecting the consistency of foreknowledge and freedom
has been conducted with little apprehension of the profound truth
that free agency and personal agency are but different formulas
for the same reality, and that, if free agency falls by the logic
of foreknowledge, personality must fall with it, and the divine
personality no less than the human. There can be no true per-
sonality or personal agency except in freedom. The necessary
freedom is the freedom of choice. For the freedom of choice
there must be the eligibility of ends — eligibility in the reality
of motives to choice. Can there be the eligibility of ends for
an omniscient mind? This is the real question of difficulty. It
is far deeper than the usual question of consistency between fore-
' Isa. xxix, 15 ; Matt, vi, 32 ; Acts xv, 8.
' Usual reference for illustration : 1 Sam. xxiii, 9-13 ; Jer. xxxviii, 17, 18 ;
Ezek. iii, 6 ; Matt, xi, 21-24.
190 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
knowledge and freedom, which concerns only the relation of fore-
knowledge in God to freedom in man, while the question in hand
concerns the consistency of omniscience and freedom, both being in
God himself.
We cannot in rational thought separate God's conception of real-
ities, even as futurities, from his motive-states respect-
8TATK\n.:NT OP ^^^S tlicm. For our thought the latter must co-exist
THK PKRPLKx- -with thc formcr and be as the former. If his concei)-
ITY. . . •
tion is eternally complete in his eternal prescience,
does it not follow that his motive-states are eternally the same
respecting all realities? Seemingly, no distinction can be made
between futurities and actualities. IIow can any thing take on a
new form or appear in a new light of interest in the view of an ab-
solute prescience? If all is eternally the same in that view, how
can we avoid the consequence of an eternally fixed and changeless
mental state, both cognitive and emotional, in God respecting all
objects of his conception? Henc3 there would seem to be no rea-
son for any choice or agency which was not eternally the same in
the divine mind. In this case only an unthinkable eternal choice
would seem possible. There could be no eligibility of ends arising
in time, no specific choices in time; and therefore only a divine
operation eternally predetermined. Such facts do not seem con-
sistent with either a true personality in God or a true personal
agency in his providence. It thus appears how far deeper this
question is than the question of consistency between divine pre-
science and human freedom. How shall the necessary adjustment
be attained ? The manifest truth of omniscience will not allow us
to replace it with the divine nescience of all free and responsible
futuritions, and thus eliminate the difficulty — if indeed this would
eliminate it.
There is no clear way out of this perplexity. Yet we should not
concede its utter hopelessness of all explication. Doubt-
THE PERPLEX- ^ , T. .^
ITT coNsiD- less the moral principles of the divme procedure are
^^^°' eternally the same in the divine consciousness; but the
divine feelings in view of moral conduct in the free subjects of
moral government are not eternally the same, as seemingly implied
in omniscience. Otherwise they would either be false to the truth
of facts, or in many instances involve a contradictory dualism in the
divine mind. Such would be the case in all instances of a radical
change of moral conduct in human life. A very wicked man may
become truly saintly — of which there are many instances. If re-
specting such there were eternally the same feelings in God, they
could not be true to the facts. This possibility is precluded by
DIVINE OMNISCIENCE. 191
the great change in moral character. If from eternity such are
regarded with reprehension as bad and with aiiproval as good, then
the unthinkable dualism must exist in the divine mind. These
implications are conclusive against an eternally changeless emo-
tional state in the mind of God respecting the free subjects of his
moral government.
It is the clear sense of Scripture that the divine feelings are not
eternally the same nor yet dualistic respecting the re- divine feel-
sponsible conduct of men, but in forms answering in '^'(> nkitiikpv
time to the moral quality of their action: feelings of eternally
displeasure against their wickedness; of clemency and ™esame.
forgiveness on their true repentance; of approving love for their
genuine piety. The truth of divine displeasure against the wicked,
whatever the subsequent change in their moral conduct, is given in
many texts; but it is a truth so familiar and sure that a few refer-
ences may suffice.^ It is in the nature of God as holy and just that
this must be so. It is equally sure on the same ground of his holi-
ness that he does not and cannot bo regard any others than the
wicked. The truth of the divine propitiousness on a true repent-
ance is also given in mznj texts.'* The whole truth of an approv-
ing love on a genuine piety mr.y be given in a single text : " He
that hath my commandments, and keepeth them, he it is that loveth
me: and he that loveth me shall be loved of my Father, and I will
love him, and will manifest myself to him.'' ^ It is thus clear that
God's personal regards of men ever answer in time to the moral
quality of their personal conduct. Those who hold the doctrine
of divine nescience, as previously noticed, may say that this pre-
cisely accords with their doctrine, and is therefore the proof
of it. We admit the agreement, and would also admit the proof
were it not for the paramount proof of the divine prescience.
But the facts which we have found do not yet bring us the
adjustment of omniscience to the divine personality and personal
agency.
Even with the doctrine of prescience, it is still open for us to
E2,y that futurities of human conduct may not be the futurities
same for the divine conception and feeling as in their and actuali-
actuality. There is some ground for this position in j^x for the
the distinctions of the divine knowledge previously con- divine mikd.
sidered. The self -intuition of God is eternal and absolute. But
the universe is the creation of liis free agency, and therefore was
eternally foreknown only as a futurity or as a freely purposed futu-
' Num. xxxii, 14 ; Bent, vii, 4 ; 2 Kings xvii, 17, 18 ; Psa. vii, 11 ; Ixxviii, 40.
« Isa. xii, 1 ; Ir, 7 ; Dan. ix, 16-19. ^ John xv, 21.
192 ' SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
rition, and known in its actuality only when by the free act of
creation this purpose was set in reality. Even as a purposed futuri-
tion it could not be the same to the divine conception and con-
sciousness as in its actuality. What is thus true respecting the
universe as a creation may be specially true respecting the moral
choices of free and responsible personalities. While eternally fore-
known, they are yet different in their actuality for the divine con-
ception, and therefore different for the divine feeling. There may
thus be a sphere of free personal agency for God. There is no
other apparent reconciliation of omniscience with either his per-
sonality or his personal agency in providence. If the distinctions
in the knowledge of God may not be claimed as absolutely valid
for the sphere of his personal free agency, they yet appear rea-
sonably sufficient; and this is about all that we could expect in so
difficult a question. But further, than this: it is surely possible
that the plenitude of personality in God may place him above
any law of determinism which may seem to us an implication of
his omniscience; so that there is for him all the reality of a free
personal agency which seems so manifest in the history of his
providence.
There is a providence of God, with ministries in time. Xor can
all this be regarded as merely executive of etei'nal pre-
MINISTRIES OF . ° mi n ^ i n ^ • ■ ^ • i •
PROVIDENCE IN dctermmations. The field of this providence is an his-
TiME. toric world developing in time. Its successive facts can
be actual for the divine conception only on their actuality. What
is thus true respecting all must be specially true respecting the free
ethical action of men. The interests of both morality and religion
require the ministries of providence in the ever-living personal
agency of God. There must be the ever-actual discrimination of
human conduct in his moral judgment; the reprehension of the
evil and the loving approval of the good in the very depths of his
moral feeling. Without these facts there is for the moral and re-
ligious consciousness no living relation of God to the present life,
and our theism must be practically as empty of vital content as
deism or pantheism. If the ministries of providence in the free
agency of God, with all the emotional activities of such ministries,
be not consistent or possible with his foreknowledge, then fore-
knowledge cannot be true. If there must be for us an alternative
between the prescience of God, on the one hand, and his true per-
sonal agency in the ministries of his providence, on the other, the
former doctrine must be yielded, while we tenaciously cleave to the
Letter, because it embodies the living reality of the divine moral
government. With all the difficulties of the question, we have not
DIVINE OMNISCIENCE. 193
found any contradictory opposition of the two doctrines, and there-
fore hold both in a sure faith.'
6. Divine Wisdom. — The wisdom of God is so closely related to
his knowledge that the former may properly be treated in connec-
tion with the latter. Yet there are elements of wisdom elements of
which do not belong to mere knowledge. For wisdom wisdom.
there must, be the practical use of knowledge. For the deepest
truth of wisdom there must be the practical use of knowledge for
benevolent ends. In the apt use of means for the attainment of
evil ends there may be ingenuity or skill which requires knowledge, ,
but there cannot be wisdom. Hence in wisdom there must be an
element of goodness, a benevolence of aim. Benevolence requires
affection. There can be no good end, either as a conception or an
aim, v/ithout the emotional nature. Hence wisdom is not purely
from the intellect, but from the intellect and the sensibility in
co-operation. The wisdom of God appears in the co-operation of.
infinite knowledge and love.
For the present life, even in its providential aspects, there is a
mixture of good and evil; so that for our view the wis-
" ' . . WISDOM AND
dom of God does not stand m the clearest light. The the magni-
circb of our vision is but a narrow one, while often "^^"^ "^ ^'^ ''"
much of it lies in the shadow of cheerless clouds.'' For our faith
there is sunshine above and upon the vast fields beyond the circle
of our vision, where the v/isdom of God is revealed in the bright-
ness of its own divine light. It is in truth deeply wrought into the
wonders of creation, providence, and grace, however hidden from
onr present view. So the Scriptures witness. Wisdom was with
God in determining the marvelous adjustments and laws of nature.^
'^ 0 Lord, how manifold are thy works I in wisdom hast thou made
thom all: the earth is full of thy riches."* The wisdom of God
assumes its divinest form in the manifestation and work of Christ,
*' in whom we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness
of sins, according to the riches of his grace; wherein he hath
abounded toward us in all wisdom and prudence."^ Thus is
made known, even unto the principalities and powers in heavenly
places, "the manifold wisdom of God, according to the eternal
purpose v.'hich he purposed in Christ Jesus our Lord." " The per-
fections of knowledge and love are here co-operative. " 0 the depth
of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God! " '
' Dorner : Christian Doctrine^ vol. i, pp. 329-337.
- Eutlsr : Analony, part i, chap, vli ; Bowne : Metaphysics, j). 847.
'Job xsviii, CO-^^". '' Tna. civ, 24. ^Ep^, i^ 7^ 8.
« Epli. i:i, 10, 11. •> Eom. xi, 33.
14
104 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
III. Divine Sensibility.
1. Senfie of Divine Sensibility. — As previously noticed, sensibil-
ity is in philosophic use for even the higliest forms of human feel-
ing; for the rational and moral as for the lower appetences and
impulses. Theology has no better term for substitution, and must
still use the same, even in application to the divine feelings. There
is an emotional nature in God. This nature is active in various
forms of feeling respecting the objects of his conception. There may
be feelings of approval or aversion, of pleasure or displeasure, of
reprehension or love. There is the reality of such emotional states
in the mind of God, as in the mind of man. This is the sense
of divine sensibility. There are certain differences between the
human and the divine which may be noted in the proper jilace.
2. Trvih of Divine Sensihility. — An emotional nature is neces-
sary to the divine omniscience ; that is, there are forms of knowl-
edge which would be impossible even to the divine mind
RKLATION CIK ° _ ...
sKxsiuii.iTYTo if totally without sensibility. It has not been properly
KNowLKDGK. considcrcd how much the sensibilities have to do with
human knowledge. In empirical knowledge our conception or no-
tion of things could not be what it is without the element furnished
by sensation. In the higher spheres of truth the feelings are nec-
essary to knowledge. Without the correlative emotions we could
have no true notion of friendship, or country, or kindred, or home.
Without the moral feelings there could be no proper knowledge of
a moral system; no true conception of moral obligation, of right
or rights, of the ethical quality of free moral action. There must
be such a law even for the divine knowledge. Certainly there
is no apparent reason to the contrary. Without an emotional nat-
ure in God, his omniscience, in the truer, deeper sense of the term,
would be impossible.
The Scriptures freely ascribe to God various forms of feeling —
abhorrence, anger, hatred, love, patience, compassion,
PROOKSOp 111*
DIVINE SENS!- clemcncy. It is very easy to pronounce all this j^ure
BiLiTY. anthropopathism, carried into the Scriptures in accom-
modation to the modes of human thought and feeling. If these
forms of feeling are not such a reality in God as to have a truthful
reflection in our own, these terms of Scripture are but empty or
deceiving words. Then divine holiness, justice, goodness, mercy,
faithfulness, are meaningless or misleading. Why this perversion
of the deepest truth of the divine nature? Too long has theol-
ogy, in its deeper si)eculative form, arrayed the living God of the
Scriptures in the apathetic bleakness of deism or pantheism. The
DIVINE SENSIBILITY. 105
endeavor to represent God as pure intellect or pure action may be
reverent in aim, but is no less a sacrifice of the most vital truth.
Without emotion God cannot be a person; cannot be the living God
for the religious consciousness of humanity. No longer could we,
in the profound exigencies of life, look up to him as the heavenly
Father. There is no heavenly Father without an emotional love.
There is the truth of an emotional love of the Father in the deep
words of the Son: "For thou lovedst me before the foundation of
the world;"' and also in those other deep and gracious words:
" God so loved the world." ^ If there is reality in one form of di-
vine sensibility there is reality in other forms. In the revelations
of God by word and deed there is as clear and full a manifestation
of sensibility as of intelligence or will. One knows his own emo-
tional states in his own consciousness. Another's he can know only
through the modes of their expression; but his knowledge is greatly
aided by reading these expressions, as he can, in the light of his
own experience. Ilence he is quite as sure, though in a different
mode, of emotional states in other minds as in his own. He is just
as sure of their sensibilities as of their intelligence or voluntary
power. We thus know the mind of God, and as surely in its emo-
tions as in its intellections and volitions. His words and deeds
which express emotions are the sign of divine realities. Otherwise
they have for us no meaning and serve only to delude.
There are certain differences between the human and the divine
sensibilities which may be noted, though seemingly open „ , p p g ^ j j^ ^
to the common view. We have forms of sensibility, as from the hu-
arising through oitr physical organism or in the circle
of our peculiar relationships in life, which can have no analogies in
the divine mind. Also our higher motive-states which arise with
our rational and moral cognitions may have an intensity of excite-
ment and a passionate impulsiveness which can have no place in
the divine emotions.
3. Distinctions of Divine Sensibility. — There is not an absolute
unity or oneness of feeling in God. His sensibilities are active in
forms answering to the distinctions of their objects. The activities
of our own higher sensibilities are conditioned on the mental appre-
hension of their appropriate objects, either as actual existences or as
ideal conceptions. This must be a law for the divine distinctions
sensibilities. It is no sign of limitation in God that for as the ob-
knowledge he requires the objects of his cognitions, or
that for the activities of his sensibilities he requires their appropriate
objects. It follows that his sensibilities must differ according to
' John svii, 24. ^ John iii, 16.
100 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
the distinctions of their objects. Tlie law which requires an object
for an affection must determine the quality of the affection accord-
ing to the character of the object. Objects of the divine affec-
tion are very different. There is the profouiKl distinction between
the physical and the moral realms ; in the former, between the
chaotic and the cosmic states; in the latter, between the ethically
evil and the ethically good. It is impossible that God should
regard these profoundly diverse objects with the same affection.
It is in the Scriptures, as in the philosophy of the facts, that he
does regard them with distinctions of affection answering to their
own profound distinctions. We might enter more largely into de-
tails; but, while the ground would be valid, the method might
prove an unseemly attempt at a divine psychology. We may with
propriety note some general distinctions.
There is in God a rational sensibility. We mean by this a con-
RATioNALSEN- sclous intcrcst in the rational order and constitution of
siBiLiTY. existences. The world is a cosmos, a world of order.
This is the possibility of a rational cosmology. For science and
philosoj)hy, we require not only rational faculties, but also an order
and constitution of existences which render them susceptible of
Bcientific and philosophic treatment. There is such an order of
existences. Both in reality and for rational thought law reigns in
the realms of nature. Physics, chemistry, botany, zoology, astron-
omy are possible because the rational order of existences places them
in correlation with rational mind. For the reason of this correlation
the rational order and constitution of existences elicit an interest in
all who have any proper notion of them. Gifted minds study them
with a profound interest. That interest ever deepens with the
clearer insight into this rational order. Thus in the spheres of study
usually regarded as purely intellectual there is an intense conscious
interest which can arise only from a profound rational sensibility.
From this view we rise to the notion of God as the original of
our own minds, and also of the forms of existence which constitute
the subjects of our scientific study. He is the author of their
rational correlation; the author of the rational constitution of exist-
ences in all the realms of nature. That orderly constitution must
have been with him, not merely an intellectual conception, but also
an end of conscious interest and eligibility. These facts evince a
profound rational sensibility in God. While he pronounces the
successive orders of the newly rising world "very good," his words
no more express the conception of a divine thought than the pleas-
ure of a divine emotion.
There is a divine aesthetic sensibility. The world, the universe,
DIVINE SENSIBILITY. 197
is as richly wrought in the forms of beauty as in the forms of
rational order. The beautiful is so lavished upon the esthetic sen-
earth and the heavens that all are recipients of its sibility.
grateful ministries. It is the fruitage of the divine constitution of
the soul within us and the divine formation of existences without
and above us. Such a correlation of the forms of nature to the con-
stitution of the mind could not have been a mere coincidence, but
must have been the divinely instituted means to a divinely chosen
end, just as in the case of a master in the science and art of music,
who through the harmonious combination of parts reaches the chosen
end of a great symphony. The beautiful in its manifold forms was
with God a chosen end in the work of creation. Therefore it was
with him more than a mere mental conception. There is no eligi-
bility for pure intellection, not even for the divine. The eligibility
of the beautiful could arise in the mind of God only with the
activity of an aesthetic sensibility. God loves the beautiful. In the
following citation we have really the presentation of both a rational
and an aesthetic sensibility in God, but especially the latter. " I
must hold that we receive the true explanation of the man-like
character of the Creator's workings ere man was, in the remarkable
text in which we are told that ' God made man in his own image
and likeness.' There is no restriction here to moral quality: the
moral image man had, and in large measure lost; but the intel-
lectual image he still retains. As a geometrician, as an arithme-
tician, as a chemist, as an astronomer — in short, in all the depart-
ments of what are known as the strict sciences — man differs from
his Maker, not in kind, but in degree — not as matter differs from
mind, or darkness from light, but simply as a mere portion of sj)ace
or time differs from all space or all time. I have already referred
to mechanical contrivances as identically the same ^ the divine
and human productions; nor can I doubt that, not only in the per-
vading sense of the beautiful in form and color which it is our priv-
ilege as men in some degree to experience and possess, but also in
the perception of harmony which constitutes the musical sense, and
in that poetic feeling of which Scripture furnishes us with at once
the earliest and the highest examples, and which we may term the
poetic sense, we bear the stamp and impress of the divine image." '
Thus in the aesthetic element of our mental constitution, the source
of pleasure in music and poetry and art, in all forms of the beau-
tiful, we see the likeness of an aesthetic sensibility in God, who
created man in his own image.''
' Hugh Miller : Testimony of the Rocks, pp. 259, 260.
'■* Le Coute : Science and Religion, lect. iii.
198 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
In the constitution of a moral personality there is moral reason,
MORAL sENsi- ^^^ ^^^^ moral feeling. The moral personality could
BiLiTY. not be complete without the latter. For the true con-
ception of a morally constituted personality and the true judg-
ment of ethical conduct, whether one's own or another's, there
must be the activity of a moral feeling. Pure intellection is not
sufficient for either the conception or the judgment. This must be
a law for even the divine mind. Without a moral consciousness
in God the creation of moral beings must have been without eligi-
bility, and therefore without reason or end. If there is any divine
teleology in the universe the creation of the highest order of beings
could not have been purposeless. The Scriptures freely express the
reality of moral feeling in the divine judgment of human conduct.
For the good there is loving approval ; for the evil, displeasure and
wrath. These facts manifest the reality of moral sensibility in
God.
We have thus presented the divine sensibility in three distinc-
tions. The moral, however, must receive further treat-
TREATMKiNT OF nicnt. Pure thought, pure intuition, pure intellection
MORAL sENsi- does not give the complete view of the divine mind.
Infinite feeling completes the view. "We hold, there-
fore, that God is not only pure thought, but he is also absolute
intuition and absolute sensibility. He not only grasj)s reality in his
absolute thought, but he sees it in his absolute intuition, and enjoys
it in his absolute sensibility. We cannot without contradiction
allow that there is any thing in the world of the thinkable which is
excluded from the source of all thought and knowledge. Our notion
of God as pure thought only would exclude the harmonies of light,
sound, and form from his knowledge ; and limit him to a knowl-
edge of the skeleton of the universe instead of its living beauty.
The notion of God as sensitive appears as anthropomorphic only
because of mental confusion. To the thoughtless, sensibility im-
plies a body ; but in truth it is as purely spiritual an affection as
the most abstract thought. All the body does for us is to call forth
sensibility ; but it in no sense produces it, and it is entirely con-
ceivable that it should exist in a purely spiritual being apart from
any body. There can hardly bo a more irrational conception of the
divine knowledge than that which assumes that it grasps reality
only as it exists for pure thought, and misses altogether the look
and the life of things. On the contrary, just as we regard our rea-
son as the faint type of the infinite reason, so we regard our intui-
tions of things as a faint type of the absolute intuition ; and so also
we regard the harmonips of sensibility and feeling as the faintest
DIVINE SENSIBILITY. I99
echoes of the absolute sensibility, stray notes wandering off from
the source of feeling and life and beauty/"
IV. Modes of Divine Moral Sensibility.
As there are distinctions of divine sensibility in the general or
comprehensive sense of the term, so there are distinctions of moral
sensibility. Moral feeling in God respects profoundly different
subjects, and reveals itself in distinctions of mode answering to
that difference of subjects. We may reach the clearer view by
studying the question in the light of these several modes. How-
ever, there is a truth of moral feeling in God which is deeper than
the more definite distinctions of mode — the moral feeling which is
intrinsic to the holiness of the divine nature. This is the first truth
to be noticed.
1. Holiness. — The Scriptures witness to the holiness of God with
the deepest intensities of expression. A few passages may be cited
for exemplification. " Who is like unto thee, 0 Lord, among the
gods ? who is like thee, glorious in holiness, fearful in praises, do-
ing wonders ? " ^ The glory of the divine holiness appears in its
manifestation, but the manifestation leads the thought to its plen-
itude in the divine nature. "Holy and reverend is his uame."^
The perfection of holiness in God is the reason for the holy rever-
ence in which all should worship and serve him. " Holy Father,"
and "0 righteous Father,"^ express in the words of Christ the
deep truth of divine holiness. "W^ho shall not fear thee, 0 Lord,
and glorify thy name ? for thou only art holy."^ These words
are responsive to words previously cited : " Who is like thee, glo-
rious in holiness ? " In tlie deepest, divinest sense, God only is
holy. The seraphim before the heavenly throne cry one to another,
"Holy, holy, holy, is the Lord of hosts ; " "and they rest not day
and night, saying. Holy, holy, holy. Lord God Almighty, which
was, and is, and is to come.""
The holiness of God is not to be regarded simply as a quality of
his nature or a quiescent mental state, but as intensely
active in his personal agency, particularly in his moral righteous-
government. In this view holiness is often called right- '''^^^'
eousness. Hence the righteousness of God is expressed with the
same intensity as his holiness. The precepts of moral duty and
the judgment and reward of moral conduct spring from his holi-
ness and fulfill its requirements. Through all the forms of instru-
mental agency he ever works for the prevention or restraint of the
' Bowne : Metaphysics, pp. 201, 202. ^ Exod. xv, 11. ^ Psa. cxi, 9.
* John xvii, 11, 25. ^ Rgy. xv, 4. ^ Isa. vl, 3 ; Rev. iv, 8.
200 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
evil and the promotion of the good. In every form and in the
deepest sense God is righteous. Abraliam apprehended this truth
in liis profound question, "Shall not the Judge of all the earth do
right ? " ' There was a special case in question ; but there is no
sense of a local or temporary limitation in the meaning of the
words. There is a universal and eternal righteousness of the divine
agency. " He is the Rock, his work is perfect ; for all his Avays
are judgment : a God of truth and without iniquity, just and right
is 1^."^ "Thy righteousness is an everlasting righteousness, and
thy law is the truth.'" These texts express the same deep sense
of an ever-present holiness in the divine moral government. " The
law of the Lord is perfect"^ — "jjerfectas the expression of the
divine holiness ; perfect therefore as the standard of right ; per-
fect in its requirements ; perfect in its sanctions. All this is
summed into one sentence by St. Paul : ' The Jaw is holy, and the
commandment holy, and jusf, and good.'''' Returning back, how-
ever, to the attribute of the Lawgiver, we are bound to believe that
all ordinances are righteous : first, with regard to the constitution
and nature of his subjects ; and, secondly, as answering strictly to
his own divine aim."* The means and the ministries of his moral
government are ever in accord with his holy law ; and, however
his righteousness may for the present be obscured or hidden even,
it shall yet be made manifest, and receive a common confession.
God will place his providences in tlie clear, full light.
scuRiTY, Fi-T- These ideas of a present obscurity and a future mani-
URK MANiFEs- festatlou arc in the Scriptures. " Clouds and darkness
TATION.
are round about him : righteousness and judgment are
the habitation of his throne." "Even so, Lord God Almighty,
true and righteous are thy judgments." '
It should be specially noted here that in the holiness of God as
operative in moral government there is the activity of
MORAL KKKF.- ^ , ° . ... . *^
iNG iNDiviNK moral feeling. This is the distinctive fact of his moral
HOLINESS. agency. If the plan of God had terminated with the
creation of a mere physical universe there would still have been a
great sphere for the activities of intelligence and will, and also for
the rational and essthetic sensibilities, but no place for moral feeling.
Such a feeling could have no office in a mere physical universe.
God would still be the same in his holy nature, with the possible or
actual activity of moral sensibility in the conception and purposed
creation of moral personalities, with the known possibility of ethically
' Gen. xviii, 25. '^ Deut. xxxii, 4. ' Psa. cxix, 142. ■* Psa. xix, 7.
' Rom. vii, 12. '' Pope : Christian Theoloijy, vol. i, p. 336.
' Psa. xcvii, 2 ; Rev. xvi, 7.
MODES OF DIVINE MORAL SENSIBILITY. 201
good and ethically evil action. On this supposition, however, there
is a reaching of the divine plan far heyond a mere physical uni-
verse, and, therefore, it remains true that an original limitation
to such a universe would require no activity of moral feeling in its
creation and government. There was no such original limitation.
In the building of the world, even from the beginning, man was
the divinely destined occupant, just as other moral intelligences
were destined for the occupancy of other worlds. Creation, there-
fore, was from the beginning the work of God in his complete per-
sonality. There was the activity of his moral sensibility, just as
of his intelligence and will. It is specially this truth which dis-
credits the distinction of the attributes into the natural and moral.
As we thus find the ultimate purpose and completion of the crea-
tion in the existence of free and responsible personalities, so we find
a moral realm as really as a physical one. Certainly in the moral
God rules in his complete personality, and no more really through
the agency of his intelligence and will than in the activities of his
moral feeling. There is as absolute a requirement for the latter as
for tlie former. A holy love of the ethically good and a holy hatred
of the ethically evil are intrinsic to the divine agency in moral gov-
ernment. We cannot think them apart. To separate them in
thought would require us to think God apathetically indifferent as
between righteousness and sin. So to think God would be to think
him not God. Holiness of action is impossible, even in
J- / HOLY FEKLlN(i
God, without the proper element of moral feeling. An necessary to
act may formally square with the law, but can be right- ""''^ action.
ecus only through the feeling from which it springs or the motive
which it fulfills. The sense of moral feeling in God, as active in
his regards of human conduct and in the ministries of his prov-
idence, is a practical necessity to the common religious conscious-
ness. It is only the sense of an emotional displeasure in God that
can effectively restrain the wayward tendencies to evil ; only the
sense of an affectionate love that can inspire the filial trust which
may become the strength of a loving obedience. There is great
practical force in the commands, "Be ye holy; for I am holy,"
and "Be ye therefore merciful, as your Father is merciful,"' but
only with the sense of true feeling in his holiness and mercy.
Divest them of true feeling, and let them stand to the religious
consciousness simply as pure thought, emotionless intellections,
and they become practically forceless. In the divine holiness there
is the intensity of holy feeling.
2. Justice. — The more appropriate place for the treatment of
> 1 Pet. i, 16 ; Luke vi, 36.
202 SYSTEMATIC TIIKOI.OCJY.
justice is in tlic discussion of atonement. For the present, the
treatment is specially in reference to the reality of an element of
holy feeling in the divine justice. Justice itself is broadly opera-
tive within the realm of moral government, i^o that the discussitni of
its offices therein must include much more than belongs to it simply
as a question of the divine attributes.
The ofiice of justice is tlie maintenance of moral government in
THK ovvw.v. ov the highest attainable excellence. The aim is the pre-
.lusTicK. vention or restraint of ein, the protection of rights, the
defense of innocence against injury or wrong, the vindication of
the government and the honor of the divine Ruler.
Divine legislation is for the attainment of these great ends. But
however great and imperative the ends, they cannot
KMIS OF 1)1- ° r ' J _
vrNK LKGis- justify any arbitrariness of judicial measures for their
LATioN. attainment. Justice has no license of departure from
the requirements of the divine holiness and righteousness. Indeed,
justice itself is but a mode of the divine holiness. In legislation
justice must respect the nature and condition of subjects. Laws
must be within their power of fulfillment, whether that power be
a native possession or a provision of the redemption in Christ. The
sanctions of law in the form of reward and penalty must have
respect to the ethical character of subjects. Emphasis should be
placed upon this principle in respect of penalty, specially for the
reason, first, that the demerit of sin is more manifest than the merit
of righteousness, and, secondly, because penalty without demerit or
beyond its measure would be more manifestly an injustice than any
reward above the merit of righteousness.
In the study of the Hebraic theocracy we must admit the presence
THE HEBRAIC ^^ mcasurcs of expediency, and not only in ritualistic
THEOCRACY. forms, but also in administrative discipline — as in the
entailment of both good and evil upon children in consequence of
the moral conduct of their parents. Such entailments, however,
were not the ministries of distributive justice, but the measures of
economical expediency for the attainment of the great ends of the
theocracy. Like measures often appear in human governments.
In terms of law the high crimes of parents are visited in certain
alienations or disadvantages upon their children; certainly not, how-
ever, that they are reckoned guilty and punishable in any proper
sense of distributive justice, but that the highest good of the gov-
ernment may be attained. That the Hebraic government was a
theocracy did not change the character of the people as its subjects.
They were still men, with all the tendencies of men under the forms
of human government. It was expedient, therefore, that God
MODES OF DIVINE MORAL SENSIBILITY. • 203
should use the necessary policies of huimm goveriimorits for the at-
tainment of the great ends of the theocracy. In this mode the
eutailmints of parental conduct upon the children took their place
as measures of economical expediency, and not as the ministries of
distributive justice, which must ever have respect to the grounds of
personal conduct.
Distributive justice is divine justice in the judicial ministries of
moral government. It regards men in their personal
O a 1 j,AW OF DIS-
character, or as ethically good or evil, and rewards or TRtnuTivE
punishes them according to the same. Any departure •""'''''^*'-
from this law must require an elimination of all that is distinctive
and essential in distributive justice. Nothing vital can remain by
which to characterize or differentiate it. We have previously said
that the demerit of sin is more manifest than the merit of right-
eousness. The former reveals i-tself in the moral and religious con-
sciousness in a clearer and intenser form than the latter. Still the
rewardableness of righteousness approves itself in that consciousness.
Also, the fact of rewardableness is thoroughly scriptural. Further,
it is both clear and scriptural that rewards must have respect to
personal righteousness. There may be other blessings, and of large
measure, but they cannot be personal rewards, and therefore cannot
be accounted the ministry of distributive justice. But sin has
intrinsic demerit, and on its own account deserves the penalties leg-
islated against it. Demerit is the only ground of just punishment.
There are great ends of penalty in the requirements of moral gov-
ernment, but, however great and urgent, they could justify no pun-
ishment except on the ground of demerit. The demerit must be
personal to the subject of the punishment. Penalties are therefore
in the strictest sense the ministry of distributive justice.
Eeward and jjenalty thus fall in with the judicial or rectoral office
of justice, which is the conservation of moral government in the
highest attainable excellence. They are means to this high end ;
just means because of the rewardableness of righteousness and the
demerit of sin; and proper means because of fitness for their end.
Distributive justice which thus deals with men on the groiind of
personal conduct is no abstract principle or law, but a concrete real-
ity in the divine personality. Justice has its seat in the moral being
of God, and apart from him is but an ideal conception. The law
of moral duty is the transcript of his mind; the sanctions of the law
the expression of his judgment of the rewardable excel-
■^ , JO _ _ _ _ MORAL FEEL-
lence of righteousness and the punitive demerit of sin. ing in divine
This judgment is not a mere apathetic mental con- •'"'''^'^'^•
caption, but includes the intense activity of moral feeling. God
204 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
lovingly approves the righteousness which he rewards with eternal
blessedness, and reprobates with infinite displeasure the sin upon
which he visits the fearful penalty of his law. The Scriptures are
replete with utterances which express or imply these truths. There
is a discriminative judgment of men according to their character :
'^For there is no respect of persons with God."' Respecting the
divine regard for the righteous, it is said : " For God is not un-
righteous to forget your work and labor of love."" Over against
these words of an affectionate and faithful friendship may be placed
the words of displeasure against the wicked : *' For the wrath of
God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unright-
eousness of men, who hold the truth in unrighteousness."' In the
divine wrath there is an emotional displeasure. This is the terrify-
ing sense of those who would have the rocks and mountains fall on
them and liide them " from the face of him that sittcth upon the
throne, and from the wrath of the Lamb."* "^For thou art not a
God that hath pleasure in wickedness : . . . thou hatcst all work-
ers of iniquity."' Just the opposite is the divine regard for the
righteous: ''For the righteous Lord loveth the righteous; his
countenance doth behold the upright."' In the final ministries of
distributive justice there are the activities of divine sensibility : in
the " Come, ye blessed of my Father," an emotional love ;• in the
** Depart from me, ye cursed," an emotional wrath.' It is thus
manifest that we find the justice of God only in his personality,
and only with an element of moral feeling.
3. Love. — No theistic truth is more deeply emphasized in the
Scriptures than love. No truth has a fuller or more grateful recog-
nition in the Christian consciousness, nor, indeed, with any who have
a proper conception of the personality of God and the plenitude
of his perfections. Neither the apathetic God of deism, nor the
unconscious God of pantheism, nor the God of agnosticism, without
any law of self-agency either in his own holy personality or in the
responsible freedom of his human subjects, is the God of the Script-
ures. " God is love."* This is the profound truth which they give
us. But, while love is so profound a truth in God, it is never dis-
rupted from his holiness. Indeed, love, as justice itself, is but a
mode of hie holiness, and in moral administration justice as well as
love still has its offices.
Any notion of God without love is empty of the most vital content
of the true idea. The very plenitude of other perfections, such as
infinite knowledge and power and justi(^e, would, in the absence of
' Rom. ii, 11. "Heb. vi, 10. = Rora. i, 18. ''Rev. vi, 16.
'Psa. V, 4, 5. «P8a. xi, 7. 'Matt, xxv, 34, 41. ^IJohniv, 16.
MODES OF DIVINE MORAL SENSIBILITY. 205
love, invest them with most fearful terrors — enough, indeed, to
whelm the world in despair. The holiness of God is ,, ,
the implication of love. Neither benevolence nor good- kkss only
ness is possible in any moral sense without love. A deed " '^" ''"^'''"
might confer a great benefit, but could not be ethically beneficent
without the impulse and motive of love. In all the benefits which
God may lavish upon the universe, he is truly beneficent only with
the motive of love. Holy love is the deepest life of all holy action.
It must be admitted that the love of God is for theism, simply in
the light of reason, a perplexing question. The per-
plexity arises in view of the magnitude of physical and kkspeutinc;
moral evil under the providence of an omniscient and thk divine
omnipotent Creator and Ruler. John Stuart Mill has
given the strength of the issue on the side of skepticism.' It is easy
to point out a false and misleading assumption which underlies his
discussion. It h that the question of evil, and of moral as of
physical evil, is purely a question of the divine knowledge and
power. The holy personality of God and the moral personality of
man, both of which must be a law of the divine agency, are thus
entirely omitted from the discussion. This omission must vitiate
the argument. However, the pointing out of this fallacy comes far
short of eliminating all the difficulties of the question. Great per-
plexity still remains. We have no theodicy of our own ; certainly
none simply in tlie light of reason. Nor have we received any
through the v/ork of others. Few questions have been more ear-
nestly and persistently discussed. AYe find the discussion mostly in
works on systematic theology, or in treatises on natural theology.
Among the authors who have made special endeavor toward the
attainment of a theodicy we might name Leibnitz,^ King,"* Bledsoe,*
Whedon,'' Navillc," McCabe.' Some of these discussions mostly
proceed on the grounds of Arminianism as against the determining
principles of Calvinism. But the great problem is still on hand;
nor do we think its solution possible simply in the resources of the
human mind. Revelation does not give the solution.
The world, with the human race, must have a personal author.
The author must possess infinite knowledge and power; ^^^ ^^
for otherwise he could not be a sufficient cause to such divine oood-
dependent existences. He cannot be of malevolent dis-
position, else the constitution of his creatures would evince a ma-
levolent purpose, and evil be manifold more than it is. That con-
' Three Essays on Religion. '^ Theodicee. ^ The Origin of Evil,
*A Theodicy. * Freedom of the Will. ^ The Problem of Evil.
' Divine Nescience of Future Contingencies,
L'OO SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
Btitution really expresses a benevolent purpose. The provisions for
the happiness of animal life above the requirements for mere sub-
sistence are many and manifest. The happiness of animal life
immeasurably exceeds its sufleriug. The com])aratively trivial evils
may not be wholly avoidable. They must be a liability in a consti-
tution of life with such provisions for its happiness. Clearly, the
constitution might have been such that suffering would have been
greatly in excess. The real facts in the case arc a manifestation of
the divine goodness.
Human suffering is greater than mere animal suffering, and
Mrcn suFFFR- therefore creates a greater jDcrplexity in the question of
iNG KROMOLu- tho dlviuc goodncss. But here other elements appear
sKLVEs. -^ |.|^g question. In his physical nature man still
touches the plane of animal life, but in his rational and moral
nature constitutes a higher realm of existence. His life in respect
of both good and evil is largely conditioned on his own free and
responsible agency. Most of the evil, both physical and moral, that
he suffers is from himself, not from his constitution, and might be
avoided.
So far as one's suffering arises from his own responsible agency,
or might be avoided Avithout omission of duty to others,
HERE PROVI- Y . ...
DExcK EASILY tho diviuc gooducss needs no vindication. The asser-
viNDicATED. ^j^^ ^£ g^^^|^ ^ nBed Is rcally the denial of all self-
responsibility for one's own condition in life. The assumption is
that God should secure the same common well-being to the idle and
"wasteful as to the industrious and provident, to the vicious as to the
virtuous, to the criminal as to the upright. This neither should be
nor can be. The false assumption re-appears that the providential
treatment and condition of men is simply a question of the divine
power. But God is a moral Euler, and men his free, responsible
subjects. Justice, therefore, must have its offices in the divine
administration. Otherwise the interests of the virtuous and upright
would deeply suffer — just as in the case of a human government
which should provide for the idle, the vicious, and the criminal all
the immunities and blessings of life usually enjoyed by the upright
and deserving. This would violate the common sense of justice,
and in the result sacrifice all the rights and interests which the gov-
ernment should sacredly protect. Such a policy would be utterly
subversive of any government, human or divine. In the divine it
would be a departure from all the laws of life, physical, rational,
and moral, and the substitution of a purely supernatural agency,
particularly in providing for the well-being of all such as are reck-
less of these imperative laws. Nothing could be more extravagant
MODES OF DIVINE MORAL SENSIBILITY. 201
or false in the notion of divine providence. God is the rational
and moral Enler of men as rational and moral subjects. This is
the only light in which to view his providence. It follows that
neither the secular nor the moral well-being of men is possible
against their own agency. Much of human suffering thus arises,
and for its existence the divine goodness needs no vindication.
Nor is any special defense needed in the case of suffering which
arises with the fulfillment of duty to others. To assert such a
need is to question or even deny the obligation of duty in all such
cases. But the truest and the best ever hold this obligation most
sacred, and its fulfillment the highest excellence.
Not all suffering, however, is avoidable. The interaction of life
upon life, inseparable from the providential relations
^ . .^ '- STILL MUCH
of humanity, is the source of evil to many. But there u-navoidable
is also a counterbalancing good to many through the s^'*"''^^'"'^^-
same law. The law of heredity in like manner works both good
and evil. The constitution of humanity renders inevitable the
results of these laws. The consequence is that the offices of the
present life are largely vicarious. The good suffer from the deeds
of the evil, and in turn serve them in the ministries of good.'
Such is the providential state of facts ; but the facts are not self-
explicative so as to clear the question of perplexity respecting the
divine goodness.
There is no solution of the problem through the solidarity of the
race, as this doctrine has been wrought into theology.
. ■' , . ° . . °'' NO LIGHT IN A
It is on this ground specially that Naville, previously solidarity ok
referred to, attempts to deal with the problem of evil. ™^ ^^^^'
This is the common Calvinistic position, whether the solidarity of
the race is held on the ground of a realistic or a rejoresentutive one-
ness. The position is that all are sinners by participation in the
sin of Adam, and that, consequently, the evils of this life are a
just retribution on the ground of that common sin. There is no
light in this doctrine. The realistic view requires an impossible
agency of each individual of the race in the sin of Adam. We did
not, and could not, so exist and act in Adam as to be individually
responsible for that original sin. The representative view concedes
the common personal innocence of that sin, but alleges a common
guilt of the sin through immediate imputation on the ground of a
divinely instituted federal headship in Adam. There is still no
light for our reason. Between the conceded personal innocence of
the Adamic sin and the common infliction of punishment there
intervenes only the immediate imputation of guilt — that is, the
' Butler : Analogy, part ii, cliap. v.
•J08 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
accountiug to us the guilt of a sin in the commission of which we
had no part. It is the doctrine of a common guilt and punishment,
without any personal demerit. Personal demerit is a sufficient
explanation of the suffering involved in its just punishment ; but
the merely imputed guilt of another's sin is no explanation of such
suffering.
The attempt is often made to reconcile human suffering with the
divine goodness on the ground that it is a necessary and
SDFFERING AS ° . . . ° . . .
A uiscii'LiNE most valuable discipline of life. That it is a valuable
OF LIKE. discipline can scarcely be questioned. There are way-
ward tendencies which it may hold in check or often correct. The
graces of gentleness, patience, kindness, and sympathy are nurtured
and matured. The fortitude and heroism developed through suf-
fering and peril have been the molding forces in the formation of
the best and noblest characters. We have examples in Abraham,
and Job, and Moses, and Paul, j^either could have attained the
sublime height of his excellence without the discipline of sore trial
and suffering. ^Many of the better and higher graces receive the
most effective culture in the necessary and dutiful ministries to the
suffering. It is thus plain that in suffering there is a large mixture
of good ; and the good is of the highest excellence and value. Nor
can it be questioned that often the good exceeds the evil. Of course,
it is still open for the skeptic to say that, while all this is true, the
real difficulty lies in such a providential constitution of human life
as to need this severe discipline of suffering. Simply in the light
of reason there is strength in this position ; but the logical implica-
tion is atheistic. Atheism, however, explains nothing, and affords
no ground for either faith or hope. An inexplicable mystery of
suffering^is far more endurable than the hopeless darkness of athe-
ism. There is manifestly great value in the discipline of suffering,
but this fact does not clear up the mystery for our reason.
There is light for our faith. The light is in the Gospel. Over
LIGHT IN THE agalust tlio Adamlc fall and moral ruin of the race the
GOSPEL. Gospel places the redemption of Christ ; over against
abounding sin, the much more abounding grace of redemption ; '
over against the suffering of this life, a transcendent eternal bless-
edness." This blessedness is infallibly sure to all who in simple
faith and obedience receive Christ as their Saviour and Lord. Nor
shall any fail of it who in sincerity and fidelity live according to
the light which they may have.' The condition of this blessedness
is most easy, and in its fruition the mystery of suffering will utterly
disappear. It is clearly thus with those who through great tribula-
' Rom. V, 15. 20. " Eom. viii, 18 ; 2 Cor. iv, 17. » Acts x, 34, 85.
MODES OF DIVINE MORAL SENSiniLTTY. 209
tion have reached the blessedness of heaven.' Dark as the picture
of the world may be for our reason, for oar faith there is light iu
the Gospel. The darkness is but the background of that picture,
while in the light of the forefront the ci'oss is clearly seen. " God
so loved the world." "Herein is love." "God is love."'' The
cross is the very outburst of his infinite love.
4. Mercy. — Mercy is a form of love determined by the state or
condition of its objects. Their state is one of suffering and need,
while they may be unworthy or ill-deserving. Mercy is at once the
disposition of love respecting such, and the kindly ministry of love
for their relief. This is the nature of all true love — true in the
reality and fullness of benevolence. It is profoundly the nature of
the divine love.
There are other terms, kindred in sense with mercy, which are
equally expressive of the gracious disposition and kind- kindrkd
ness of love. We may instance compassion or pity, terms.
propitiousness or clemency, forbearance or long-suffering. All true
love regards its suffering objects with compassion or pity. This is
profoundly true of the divine love. It is exemplified in the com-
passion of Jesus for the multitudes, faint, and scattered abroad, as
sheep having no shepherd ; and for the poor leper whom he touched
and healed.' Such is the compassion of God for the suffering ;
even for the unworthy and the ill-deserving." So the Scriptures
emphasize the pity of the Lord, which, equdly with his compassion,
has respect to the suffering and need of nan. Pity is expressed
in words of pathetic tenderness.^ Propitiousness or clemency is the
divine disposition to the forgiveness and salvation of the sinful and
lost." The forbearance cr long-suffering of God manifests the full-
ness and tenderness of his clemency. He is reluctant to punish,
and waits in patience for the repentance of the sinful, that he may
forgive and save them.'
Thus the Scriptures emphasize these terms which are kindred in
sense with mercy. In numerous texts they are grouped with mercy,
BO that all are emphasized together. Still mercy receives its own
distinct expression, and often, in terms of the deepest intensity.
God is the Father of mercies ; his tender mercies are over all his
works ; and his mercy endureth forever.**
' Eev. vii, 13-17, - JoTin iii, 13 ; 1 John iv, 10, 1(3.
3 Matt, ix, 36 ; Mark i, 41.
■* Psa. Ixxxvi, 15 ; cxi, 4 ; cxlv, 8 ; Lam. iii, 22.
5 Psa. ciii, 13 ; James iii, 11. * Psa. Ixxviii, C3 ; Isa. Iv, 7 ; Heb. viii, 12.
' Exod. xxxiv, G ; Eom. ii, 4 ; 2 Pet. iii, 0, 15.
* 2 Cor. i, 3 ; Fja. cxlv, 0 ; cxviii, 1.
15
210 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
There is an emotional clement in mercy, and in all kindred forms
AN EMOTIONAL ^^ ^^® divlnc disposltlon. Mercy, pity, clemency,
iLEMENT IN loug-sufferiiig — these are not mere forms of divine
MERCY. thought, but intensities of divine feeling, and would
be impossible without an emotional nature in God. Divest them
of this sense and they become meaningless, and must be powerless
for any assurance and help in the exigencies of suffering and
need.
5. Truth. — Truth in God may be resolved into veracity and
fidelity.
Veracity is the source of truthfulness in expression, whether in
the use of words or in other modes. It is deeper than
AS VERACITY
mere intellect ; deep as the moral nature. With all
true moral natures veracity is felt to be a profound obligation.
Veracity is revered, while falsehood, deceit, hypocrisy are abhorred.
In the truest, deepest sense of veracity there is profound moral
feeling. The divine veracity is more than truthfulness of expres-
sion from absolute knowledge ; it is truthfulness from holy feeling.
As God solemnly enjoins truthfulness upon men, and severely
reprehends its violation, in whatever forms of falsehood or deceit,
80 his own words and ways ever fulfill the requirements of the most
absolute veracity.
This is the guarantee of truthfulness in the divine revelation,
though not the requirement of a revelation of all truth. There
may be much truth above our present capacity of knowledge ; much
that does not concern our present duty and interest. Xor does
the divine veracity require such a revelation tliat it can neither be
mistaken nor perverted. Certainly vfQ are not competent to the
affirmation of such a requirement. Otherwise we might equally
pronounce against all the tests of a probationary life — which is the
same as to pronounce against probation itself. "Whether we shall
rightly or wrongly interj)ret the Scriptures in respect to our faith
and practice, according to the light and opportunity which we may
have, is one of the tests of fidelity to duty in the present probation,
and in full consistency with othe* tests.' Errors in respect to
moral and religious truth are mostly the fruit of perverting feel-
ing— such feeling as we responsibly indulge, and might correct or
replace with a better disposition toward the truth. "With simplicity
of mind and a love of tlie truth we may find in the Scriptures all
the lessons of moral and religious duty requisite to a good life and
a blessed immortality.'
' Butler : Analogy, part ii, chap. vi.
« Matt, vi, 22 ; John vii, 17 ; viii, 31, 33 ; Eph. i, 17, 18 ; Jamea i. 5.
MODES OF DIVINE MORAL SENSIBILITY. 211
Fidelity in G-od specially respects liis promises, and is the guar-
antee of their fulfillment. There are contingencies of
».,.■■ ■ * • 1 1 -i AS FIDELITY.
failure in human promises. A promise may be deceit-
fully given. Unforeseen events may effect a change of disposition
respecting fulfillment. With abiding honesty in the promise, new
conditions may render fulfillment impossible. These contingencies
of failure arise out of the possible dishonesty and the actual limita-
tions of men. No such contingencies can affect the divine fidelity.
The holiness of God is the infinite sincerity of his promises, and
the plenitude of his perfections the absolute power of fulfillment.
The Scriptures emphasize these truths.'
Fidelity in God is thus a truth of priceless value. It is the ab-
solute guarantee of his '^ exceeding great and precious promises.'"*
These promises, in the fullness and fitness of their content, are
sufficient for all the exigencies of life, and are absolutely sure of
fulfillment to all who properly meet their terms.
In the faithfulness of God there is an element of holy feeling. A
certain measure of fidelity with men may be a matter .„ ^ „„^,^
'' -^ ^ AN ELEMENT
of conventional pride or personal honor. It is truer of holy keel-
and deeper just as it is grounded in moral feeling, and ""*"■
finds its ruling motive in a sense of moral duty. It is the stronger
and surer Just in the measure of this moral feeling. Fidelity in
God is the more assuring to us with the deeper sense of his holy
feeling as its essential element and ruling principle.
Y. DiviisrE Omnipotence.
As previously noted, we use the term omnipotence in preference
to personal will for this attribute, because it better expresses the
plenitude of the divine power. However, we shall not thus be led
away from the true nature of this attribute.
1. Power of Personal Will. — As God is a purely spiritual being
his power must be purely spiritual. This, however, does not deny
to him power over physical nature. As he is both a spiritual and
personal being his power must be that of a personal will. This is
at once the logic of the relative facts and the sense of Scripture.
This sense will clearly appear in treating the omnipotence of the
divine will.
Nothing is more real in one's consciousness than the exertion of
energy. The energizing is of the personal self through reality of
the personal will, with power over the mental facul- self-ener-
ties and the physical organism. How there is a vol-
untary self-energizing, with power over the physical organism, and
« Num. xxiii, 19 ; Tit. i, 3 ; Heb. vi, 17, 18. ' 3 Pet. i, 4.
212 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
through it over exterior physical nature, is for us an insoluble mys-
tery. The facts, however, are most real, and the mystery cannot
in the least discredit them. There is an equal mystery in the
power of the divine will, but it can no more discredit the reality of
this power than in the case of the human will. If for any power
over exterior physical nature the human will is now dependent upon
a physical organism, this may be simply the result of a present con-
ditioning relation of such an organism to the personal mind, and not
an original or intrinsic limitation. Indeed, there must be an intrin-
sic power of the will, else there could be no voluntary self-energiz-
ing with power over the physical organism. There must be an im-
mediate power of the will over the physical organism; or, at most,
the contrary is mere assumption so long as we cannot show either
the reality or the necessity of any mediation. Even with the neces-
sity of such mediation for the human will, it would not follow that
the divine will is so conditioned. Omnipotence is self-sufficient.
2. Modes of Voluntary Agency. — As God is a personal being, he
must possess the power and freedom of personal agency. The free-
dom of personal agency is the freedom of choice. In complete
personal agency there must be a distinction between the elective
volition in the choice of ends and the executive volition in giving
effect to the choices. There must be this distinction in the modes
of the divine agency.
If personality and personal agency be realities in God, he must
„. -.-„,,. .. freely choose his own ends and determine his own acts.
KLECTIVE DI- •' ^
TINE TOLi- Any sense of his absoluteness preclusive of specific
TioNs. choices and definite acts in time is contradictory to iiis
personal agency, and therefore to his personality. The assumption
that knowledge in God must be causally efficient and immediately
creative or executive is utterly groundless, With omniscience as
an immediate and eternal knowing in God and immediately crea-
tive or executive, there could be no personal agency. The two are
in contradictory opposition. With the" truth of the former, all
predication of personal agency would be false. For God there could
be no rational ends, no eligibility or choice of ends, no purpose or
plan. Then the universe must be a necessary evolution, but witli-
out divine teleology or one act of divine personal agency. By the
supposition of knowledge in God, he might passively know the on-
going of the evolution, but could have no active part in the process.
There could be no divine providence. These inevitable implications
are false to reason and the sense of Scripture. As a personal being
God must freely elect his own ends and determine his own acts.
His personal will completes the power of such agency.
DIVINE OMNIPOTENCE. 213
We must also distinguish between the elective and executive
ascency of the divine will. The choice of an end is not „^^^,^^,^^ „,
its producing cause. If such a cause, the effect must vine voli-
be instant upon the choice. In this case there could '''^^''''^•
be for God no plan or method of his agency, no futurition of his
own deeds. But God has chosen ends, and plans for their etfectua-
tion through future deeds. This is the requirement of a divine
teleology and a divine providence. The truth of such a mode of
personal agency is in the Scriptures. Promise and prophecy, so
far-reaching in their scope, are full of such facts. The futurities
of promise and prophecy, so far as dei3endent upon the immediate
agency of God, must have their future effectuation by the causal
energy of his personal will. There is thus determined for the
divine will an executive office in distinction from its elective office.
3. Onuiipotence of the Divi7ie Will. — Will as a personal attribute
is an infinite potency in God. As a voluntary power it is operative
at his pleasure. The contradictory or. absolutely impossible is in
no proper sense contrary to the omnipotence of his will. These
statements are in full accord with the Scriptures. God is the Al-
mighty.' God is in the heavens: he hath done whatsoever he hath
pleased.' His counsel shall stand, and he will do all his pleas-
ure.' He has made the heavens and the earth by his great power,
and there is nothing too hard for him.* Hedosth according to his
will in the army of heaven, and among the inhabitants of the earth.*
With God all things are possible.^
The omnipotence of God is manifest in his works of creation and
providence. The concentration of all finite forces into
, -J... iil'r.-i.l- rc-j. OMNIPOTKNCE
a single point oi energy would be innnitely insumcient i^ creation
for the creation of a single atom. In the sublime words, ^^^ provi-
*'In the beginning God created the heaven and the
earth," there is the agency of an omnipotent personal will. Only
such a will is equal to the creation of. the universe, and to the
divine providence which rules in the universal physical and moral
realms.
' Gen. xvii, 1. - Psa. cxv, 3. * Isa. xlvi, 10.
^ Jer. xxxii, 17. ^ Dan. iv, 35. "^Matt. xix, 26.
214 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
CHAPTER IV.
DIVINE PREDICABLES NOT DISTINCTIVELY ATTRIBUTES.
As previously noted, classifications mostly include truths respect-
ing God which are not properly attributes. These truths are im-
portant and sliould not be omitted, but we think it far better to
treat them separately than in a wrong classification. Their own
distinctive sense can thus be more clearly given, while confusion is
avoided in the treatment of the attributes.
It is unnecessary to notice all the truths, or all the terms for truths,
which have been thus wrongly classed. Some are only a repetition
of others in sense. For instance, immensity, as thus used, can add
nothing to the sense of infinity or omnipresence, specially as it i3
usually given. Self-sufficiency, another of these terms, is pro-
foundly true of God, but the whole truth is given in his eternal per-
sonality, omniscience, and omnipotence. Other truths, however,
are so definite in themselves, or so special in their relation to the
attributes, that they should be properly considered. Such are the
eternity, unity, omnipresence, and immutability of God.
I. Eternity of God.
1. Sense of Divine Eternity. — In its simplest sense, the eternity
of God is his existence without beginning or end; in its deepest
meaning, his endless existence in absolute unchangeableness of
essence or attribute.
Eternity of being must be accepted as a truth, however incom-
ETERNiTT OF preheusiblc for thought. The only alternatives are an
BEING. absolute nihilism or a causeless origination of being in
time. Nihilism can never be more than the speculative oj)inion of
a few. Self-consciousness ever gives the reality of self, and is the
abiding and effective disproof of nihilism. A causeless origination
of being in time is absolutely unthinkable. We must accept the
truth of eternal being. Hence the eternity of God encounters no
peculiar difficulty; for there is no more perplexity for thought in
the eternity of a personal being than in the eternity of matter or
physical force.
The question arises respecting the relation of God to duration or
time. It is really the question whetlier he exists in duration or in
ETERNITY OF GOD. 215
an eternal now. There is no eternal now. The terms are contra-
dictory. The notion of duration is inseparable from relation of
the notion of being. Just as the notion of space is god to time.
inseparable from the notion of body. Being must exist in dura-
tion. God is the reality of being, and none the less so because of
his personality. The perplexity arises with the divine personality,
particularly with the divine omniscience. Can there be mental
succession in omniscience? The real question here concerns the
personality of God rather than his relation to time. This we have
previously considered, with full recognition of its difficulty. We
cleave to the reality of personality in God, and could not surrender
it for the satisfaction of thought respecting his omniscience, or the
consistency of the one with the other. In the previous treatment
we could not clear the question of all perplexity, but found no
such contrariety between personality and omniscience as to discredit
either.
2. Eternity of Original Cause. — Science may find an unbroken
succession of physical phenomena, in which each is in turn effect
and cause, but it cannot find the initiation of the series in i^hysical
causation. In the absence of a personal cause, the only alterna-
tives are an infinite series and an uncaused beginning. Neither
is thinkable or possible. Eeason requires a sufficient cause for a
beginning and for the marvelous aggregate of results. God in
personality is the only sufficient cause. He must therefore be an
eternal personal existence. This sublime truth is in the opening
words of Scripture: " In the beginning God created the heaven and
the earth."
3. Truth of the Divine Eternity in Scripture. — The Scriptures
give frequent and sublime utterance to the divine eternity. Abra-
ham calls upon the name of the everlasting Lord.' God proclaims
himself the I am that I am,^ which embodies the deep truth of
his absolute eternity. The same truth is in the sublime words of
the psalmist: " Before the mountains were brought forth, or ever
thou hadst formed the earth and the world, even from everlasting
to everlasting, thou art God." ^ He is the high and lofty One who
inhabiteth eternity;^ the King eternal.^
The eternity of God is simply the absolute duration of his exist-
ence, and in no sense a quality or attribute of his be- p^jj^tion no
ing, just as space is no quality or property of body. QUALixr op
We may speak of the spatial properties of matter, but
we can only mean such as appear or project in space. But such
' Gen. xxi, 33. ' Exod. iii, 14, ^ Psa. xe, 3.
■* Isa. Mi, 15. 6 1 Tim. i, 17.
2 Hi SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
properties are purely from the nature of matter, and in no seu^o
either constituted or modified by space. Being must exist in dura-
tion, because being must abide, and is being only as it abidcb. But
its abiding is purely from its own nature, not from any quality or
influence of time. Many forms of existence are temporal, but from
their constitution or condition, not from any influence of time.
Time is no quality of any existing thing. Eternity is no attribute
of God; no quality cither of his essential being or of his pcreonal
attributes. His absolute eternity is no less a profound and sublime
trutli.
11. UxiTV OF God,
1. Sense of Dioiuc Umly. — Unity does not well express the the-
i>EFi(:iKNciKs i^t^c truth for v/hicli it has long been in common use,
oFTHKTERM. tbougli it uiayuot be easy to replace it with a better
term. Its deficiency arises from its applicability to any thoroughly in-
dividuated body, however many its elements or complex its organism.
Thus a stone is one, a tree is one, a man is one, God U one in perfect
simplicity and uncliangeableness of being, one in an absolute, eter-
nal unity. Thoro h still a deeper sense of the divine unity, and
one Avhich the torm still more signally fails properly to express, A
stone, a tree, a man — each is one of a kind. They belong to specif-
ical orders. God is not one of a kind. He is infinitely above all
the categories of species. He exists in absolute soleness of essential
divinity. This is the deepest sense of his unity. For the expres-
sion of this sense wo have from Dorner the word solUy.
2. Rational Evidence of Divine Unity. — "With all the diversities
of nature, there are such harmonies as evince a iinity of divine orig-
inal. The more complete the discoveries of science, the fewer and
simpler are found to be the laws of 2)liysical nature. It is even
claimed that the various distinctions of force express simply modes
of the one force. Certain it is that the elements of physical nature
are so few and in sucli correlation that a few simple laws determine
the cosmic order of the earth and the heavens. If the light of this
order reveals a divine Creator, it certainly reveals only one. Or-
ganic structures are formed upon Guch a unity of plan and in such
a harmony of orders that there must be one Creator of all. Ka-
tional intelligence and moral reason are the same in all men, and
the profoundest reason must determine one divine original of all.
The three orders of the j^hysical, the animal, and the rational are
so diverse that they might seem to point to diverse originals ; but
they all so blend in man that in tlie light of this union it is man-
ifest that there is one, and only one, Creator of all.
3. Unity of God in the Scriptures. — The Ten Comniaiuinu'uts
UNITY OF GOD. 217
embody the profoimd truth of the divine unity.' This truth is
their transcendent moral and religious power. The Lord declares
himself God in heaven and earth, besides whom there is no other ;
and on this ground claims the reverent and unreserved obedience
of his people.^ The Lord our God is one Lord. Therefore we
must love him with the whole heart.' With slight variations of
expression, this same truth of the unity of God is often declared.
The Lord says, " I, even I, am he, and there is no God with me."^
"Thus saith the Lord the King of Israel, and his Eedeemer the Lord
of hosts ; I am the first, and I am the last ; and beside me there is no
God."^ "We know that an idol is nothing in the world, and that
there is none other God but one." " Thus is given the Scripture sense
of the divine unity. There is only one God, Creator, and moral Euler.
He only must be worshiped, because he only is God. In perfect
agreement with these truths is the sublime monotheism of St. Paul.'
4. No Requirement for Plurality. — Polytheism is the result of a
vicious perversion of the intuitive and rational notion of God. This
is the account of it given by St. Paul.^ It is also in complete accord
with the moral grounds upon which he had just based the respon-
sibility of the Gentile world." Polytheism can have no co-existence
in any mind with the true notion of God. If there are any facts which
seem contrary to this view, it is only in appearance, not in reality.
No other God can be admitted to the faith and worship of the soul
while in possession of the unperverted notion of the true God.
There is no demand for another. The one true God satisfies the
most searching logic of the question, the clearest intuitions of the
reason, and the profoundest religious feeling. In the clear vision
of the true God there is no 2:)lace for another.
Unity is not in any sense determinative of what God is in him-
self. Just the reverse is the truth. God is the deep- unity not an
est unity because he only is absolute spirit, existing in attribute.
eternal personality, with the infinite perfection of personal attri-
butes. This deepest unity is, therefore, in no sense constitutive
or determinative of what God is in himself, but is purely consequent
to the infinite perfections v/hich are his sole possession. Unity is
therefore in no proper sense an attribute of God.
III. Omnipresence op God.
1. Notion of nn Infinite Essence. — The omnipresence of God,
however sure in its reality, has been regarded as very difficult for
' Exod. XX, 3-17. '^ Dent, iv, 39, 40. =Deut. vi, 4, 5.
* Deut. xxxii, 39. ■'' Isa. xliv, 6, * 1 Cor. viii, 4.
' Acts xvii, 32-31. ^ Eom. i, 21-2.^. » Eom. i, 18-20.
218 SYSTEMA'IIC THEOLOGY.
Bpeculative thought. Mucli of this perplexity, however, arises from
a misconception of the question ; particularly from the rather com-
mon theological opinion that an essential omnipresence of God is
the necessary ground of his omniscience and the potency of his will.
This will appear as we proceed.
The doctrine of an infinite essence of being should be carefully
guarded in both thought and expression. Otlierwise it
vi^ws OF 1)1- »i3,y become the foundation of pantheism. In all true
VI NK uBiy- theism the divine essence is pure, absolute spirit. All
UITY. ...
sense of magnitude or spatial extension is alien to such
a nature, and sliould be excluded from our notion of the divine
ubiquity. Much of our experience is a hinderance to this exclusion.
As so many existences known to us in sense-perception appear in the
form of magnitude or spatial extension, it is the more difficult for us
to dissociate the notion of such extension from any form of essential
being. Thus if we think of God as essentially present in all worlds
we tend to tliink of his essence as a magnitude reaching all in a mode
of extension, and as filling all the interspaces. The notion is ut-
terly inconsistent with pure spirituality of Ijeiug. If, however, we
still assert the essential ubiquity of God, but hold our thought rig-
idly to the notion of pure spiritual being, we must at once be con-
scious of an utter incapacity to form any conception of the manner
iu which he is thus omnipresent. Shall we deny the essential ubiq-
uity because of its mystery, or hold fast to it notwithstanding the
mystery? We shall find that tlie question of such a presence of
God possesses very little interest when we attain the real truth of his
ubiquity.
The real truth is not in the sense of a ubiquitous divine essence.
In such a view the essence is considered simply in itself,
NOT A UBIylll- i,,-ii A 1 -L L.
TY i\ DIVINE Without the personal attributes. As such, it cannot
ESSENCE. exercise the agency which must ever be a reality of the
divine presence. Indeed, personal agency is for us the only vital
reality of this presence. A mere essential presence is not only with-
out agency, but must be without any distinction with respect to
places or existences : must be the same with forms of physical nat-
ure as with morally constituted personalities ; the same with the
ethically evil as witli the ethically good ; the same in the empty
space as in the living Church; tlie same in hell as in heaven. Noth-
ing could be more aberrant from anv rational or scriptural sense of
the divine ubiquity.
The notion of an omnipresent divine essence as the necessary
o-round of omniscience and omni])otonce involves insuperable diffi-
culty. Omniscience and omnipotence are purely personal attri-
OMNIPRESENCE OF GOD. 219
butes. Hence the necessity of an essential ubiquity to these attri-
butes can be asserted only on the assumption that God perplexities
can have knowledge and exert energy only where he is of that view.
locally present. If this be true, then personality in God must
itself be so broadened in extension as to be omnipresent. Nothing
could be more inconceivable or more contradictory to the nature
of personality. In the light of reason and consciousness, as in the
nature of its constitutive facts, personality is self-centered and
above all spatial quality or relation. Neither knowledge nor the
energy of will can have any dependence on so alien a quality as
extension in sjiiritual essence and personality. The truth of the
divine ubiquity must lift it above all spatial quality and relation
and hold it as a purely personal reality.
2. Omnipresence through Personal Perfectiohs. — We have pre-
viously stated that the personal agency of God is the vital reality of
his presence. This truth is so obvious that it requires neither
elucidation nor proof. There is an infinite plenitude of personal
agency in the omniscience and omnipotence of God. His omnis-
cience embraces the universe of realities, and all are subject to his
omnipotence, according to his wisdom and pleasure. In the pleni-
tude and perfection of these personal attributes God is omnipresent
in the truest, deepest sense of the term. This doctrine obviates the
insujDcrable difficulties of an extensive or spatial ubiquity, and, in-
stead of grounding omniscience and omnipotence in the omnipres-
ence of God, finds the reality of his omnipresence in the plenitude
of those attributes.'
This doctrine easily adjusts itself to the divine agency, which is
operative in all the realms of existence, and in modes
. .... ACCORDS WITH
answering to their distinctions. While operating in all, thk pivine
it is in no pantheistic sense of a monistic infinite neces- ^^"''■^'^'^•
sarily developing in mere phenomenal forms, but in the manner of
a personal agency which secures the transcendence of God above all
the realms of created existence. Such an agency adjusts itself to
the profoundest distinction of the physical and moral realms, and
equally to the profoundest ethical distinctions of the moral.
3. TJie True Serise of Scripture. — The Scriptures repeat the sub-
lime utterances of the divine ubiquity. These utterances
^ '' OMNIPRESKNCE
are the expression of a personal ubiquity through the ix pkrsonai.
perfection of knowledge and the plenitude of power. ^^"'^'^*^'^-
'^ Whither shall I go from thy Spirit ? or whither shall I flee from
' Martensen : Christian Dogmatics, pp. 93, 94 ; Venema : System of Theology,
p. 193; Van Oosterze«5 : Christian Dogmatics, vol. i, 258; Dorner : Christian
Doctrine, vol. i, pp. 340, 341 ; Bowne : Metaphysics, p. 208.
O'.'O SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
thy presence?"' These words are the center of a long passage
which expresses tlie omnipresence of God in terms of the deepest
intensity. In these terms we find the reality and the absolnteness
of this omnipresence in the omniscience of God and the omnipo-
tence of his will. While God dwells in heaven, he also dwells with
the contrite and humble in sj)irit to revive and comfort them.^
These are purely personal ministries, and, therefore, signify a pres-
ence of God Avith the contrite and humble in his personal agency.
" Thus saith the Lord, The heaven is my throne, and the earth is
my footstool."' Here is first the expression of the greatness and
majesty of God; then the expression of his kingly government. He
is enthroned in heaven and rules over all the realms of existence.
In the representation God is personally local, but his personal
agency is every-where operative. Thus he is present in all the
universe in the comprehension of his knowledge and the infinite
potency of his will. " Am I a God at hand, saith the Lord, and
not a God afar off? Can any hide himself in secret places that I
shall not see him? saith the Lord. Do not I fill heaven and earth?
saith the Lord."" There is no interpretation of the omnipresence
of God as here expressed except through the infinite perfection of
his personal attributes. ^^For in him we live, and move, and have
our being." ^ This text is central in St. Paul's sublime expression
of the being and providence of God. He is Creator and Ruler of
all — Lord of heaven and earth. He giveth to all life, and breath,
and all things. The sense of the broader and more detailed state-
ments centers in the words cited. How is it that we live, and move,
and have our being in God? Only through his personal agency.
Any departure from this sense may run into the extravagance of
mysticism, on the one hand, or into the bleakness of pantheism, on
the other. There is no hylozoism. in the theism of the Scrii)tures.
The agency of God, in whatever realm, is purely and solely a per-
sonal agency. The immanence of God in the universe must leave
his personal transcendence complete. Through the infinite effi-
ciencies of his personal agency all systems of Avorlds and all orders
of rational and moral intelligences were created ; through the same
agency all are preserved. God is present with all — omnipresent in
his personal agency.
The omnipresence of God is a great truth: but as it is
NOT DISTINCT- ^ ° . .
ivKi,Y AN AT- solely through the perfection of his personal attributes
TRIBUTE. .^^j jj^ ^i^p efficiencies of his personal agency, it cannot
itself in any distinctive sense be classed as an attribute.
' Psa. cxxxix, 7. 'Isa. Ivii, 15. ^Isa. Ixvi, 1.
■« Jer. xxiii, 23, 24. ' Acts xvii, 28.
IMMUTABILITY OF GOD. 221
IV. Immutability of GtOd.
1. The Truth in Scripture. — This great truth also receives itr,
intensely forceful expression in the Scriptures. " I am that I
AM " ' is at once the truth of the divine eternity and of the divine
immutability, and of the latter in as profound a sense as of the
former. " The counsel of the Lord standeth forever, the thoughts
of his heart to all generations."" Here the thought rises from God
in himself to the principles of his providence and asserts his im-
mutability therein. The very heavens, seemingly so changeless and
eternally permanent, are, in comparison with God, but as a fading,
jierishing garment, while he is eternally the same.' "I am the
Lord, I change not: " " a truth of his providence, as of his being and
attributes. God is ''the Father of lights, with whom is no variable-
ness, neither shadow of turning."' These words express a lofty
conception of the divine immutability.
2. Immutability of Personal Perfections. — We previously pointed
out the truth of immutability in the essential being of God. It is
the truth of his eternal absolute identity of being. He is immuta-
ble in the plenitude and perfection of his personal attributes. His
omniscience, holiness, justice, love, considered simply as attributes,
are forever the same. Definite and varying acts of personal agency,
and new facts of consciousness, such as must arise with the personal
energizing of will in his creative and providential work, are entirely
consistent with such immutability. The earth and the heavens, as
temporal forms of existence, are ever in a process of change ; but
even this ceaseless change arises from changeless laws, which point
to an unchangeable divine original. In the perfection of his per-
sonal attributes God is forever the same.
3. Immutahility of Moral Principles. — Sacred history discloses a
changing frame- work of expediency in the older dispensations of re-
vealed religion, and a great change from the elaborate ceremonials
of Judaism into the simple forms of Christianity, but the same
moral principles abide through all these economies. Change within
the sphere of expediency is entirely consistent with the unchange-
ableness of God, while the changeless moral principles are a profound
reality of his immutability. That ho regards the same person now
with reprehensive displeasure, and again v/ith approving love, is not
only consistent with his immutability, but a requirement of it in
view of the moral change in the object of his changed regards.
The immutability of God is a great truth in the Scriptures, and
'Exod. iii, 14. '■' Psa. xxxiii, 11. ^Psa. cii, 25-27.
Hlal. iii, 6. ^Jas. i, 17.
222 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
a truth vital to morality and religion ; but as it arises from the
NOT A DISTINCT perfcctiou of his personal attributes, and is equally a
ATTRiBUTK. reality of each, it is not itself an attribute in any dis-
tinctive sense.'
' Works on theism more or less discuss the questions of the nature, person-
alit}'^, and attributes of God ; hence, much of the literature given in connection
with theism is appropriate for present reference.
Systems of theology very uniformly discuss these same questions. Works of
the kind are so well known that no detailed reference is necessary. It will suf-
fice that we name a few authors : Knapp ; Nitzsch ; Watson ; Hodge ; Pope ;
Breckinridge ; Raymond ; Martensen ; Shedd ; Van Oosterzea ; Corner ; Smith ;
Strong.
Special reference. — Samuel Clarke : Being and Attributes of God, Boyle Lect-
ure, vol. ii ; Chamock : The Eocistence and Attributes of God ; Bates : Harmony
of the Divine Attributes ; Pearson : Exposition of the Creed, article i ; Barrow :
Works, vol. ii, ** The Apostles' Creed," sermons x-xii ; Saurin : Set-nions, " The
Divine Attributes," sermons ii-xi ; Christlieb : Modei^n Doubt and Christian
Belief, lects, iii, iv ; Howe : Works, " Oracles of God," lects. xi, xii, xvii-xxv ;
Macculloch : Proofs and Illustrations of the Attributes of God ; Robert Hall :
Spiritualitii of the Divine Nature, Works, vol. iii, pp. 295-310; Dwight : The-
ology, vol. i, sermons iv-xiii ; Harris : The Self-Revelation of God, part iii ;
Midler : Christian Doctrine of Sin, vol. ii, pp. 13-39 ; Smith : Existence and
Nature of God; Thompson : Christian Theism, book iv.
QUESTIONS OF THE TRINITY. 223
CHAPTER V.
GODINTRinsriTY.
In the doctrine of the Trinity there are questions of fact, and
also a question of harmony in the facts. The latter is the chief
question in the construction of the doctrine. It is a
1 _ _ . . DIFFICULTIES
•very difficult question. We do not think it open to oftheques-
full explication in human thought. It is not wise to ^'°^"
attempt more than is attainable. Yet the manifest prudence of
this law has often been violated in strivings after an unattainable
solution of this doctrine. We shall not repeat the error. Still, the
divine Trinity is so manifestly a truth of Scripture, and so cardinal
in Christian theology, that the question cannot be omitted. If a
full solution cannot be attained, the facts may be so presented as
not to appear in contradictory opposition. With this attainment,
nothing hinders the credibility of the doctrine on the ground of
Scripture.
It is proper to open the discussion with a distinct statement of
the constituent elements of the doctrine. Following this, the doc-
trine itself, as held in the faith of the Church, should be so far
treated as to present it in its proper formulation. Then before
the completion of the discussion the essential divinit}^ of the
Son of God, and the personality and divinity of the Holy Spirit,
must receive distinct and special treatment. This treatment is
necessary because these questions involve essential elements of
the doctrine.
I. Questions of the Trinity.
1. The Unity of God. — This is the first question of fact, but
really a question not in issue. Trinitarianism is not tritheism;
nor are trinitarians less pronounced on the unity of God than uni-
tarians. The sense of this unity is embodied in the term designa-
tive of the personal distinctions in the Godhead. It follows that
the unity of God is the basal truth in the doctrine of
. .. , . . BASAL TROTH
the Trinity. But as this question is not in issue as be- of the doc-
tween trinitarianism and unitarianism, and especially ''''''^^•
as we have previously considered it in its distinctive application to
God, it requires no further treatment here.
224 SYSTEMATIC THKOI.OC Y.
2. Tviiud Disllndion of Divine rerxon^. — The doctrine of the
Trinity asserts tlie personal distinctions of tlic Father, <ind the Son,
and the Holy S])irit, and the essential divinity of eacli.
Of course, there is no issue respecting the Father. "With all
THE DiviNK theists his personality and divinity are above (|Ucr-tion.
FATiiEKiioon. However, the real sense of the divine Fatherhood must
be determined by the doctrine of the Son. If the Son is only hu-
man in his nature, then, however rich his endowments, the rela-
tion of God to the human gives the fullest sense of his Fatherhood.
Ariauism may raise this sense to a higher significance, but the
plenitude of its meaning can be given only with the essential divin-
ity of the Son. Only this can give the full meaning of the Fa-
ther's love of the Son; ' the full sense in which he is the only be-
gotten Son;'"' the infinite significance of the Father's love in the
redemption of the world.' The sublimest theistic truth of the
Scriptures is embodied in this definite reality of the divine Father-
hood. For the religious consciousness it possesses a fullness of truth
and grac3 far above all the creative work of God. His fatherly re-
lation to man and to all intelligences is a great and grateful truth;
but the truth of his Fatherhood most replete with benedictions is
given only with the divine Sonship of the Saviour.
The doctrine of the Trinity encounters little issue respecting
RESPErTi\<; ^^6 personality of the Son. Even Sabellianism and
TiiKsox. Swedenborgianism, which hold a mere modal Trinity,
admit his personality, though both deny to him any personal dis-
tinction from the Father. It is in this that both depart from
tlie true doctrine of the Trinity. The antagonism to the divin-
ity of the Son, as posited in the doctrine of the Trinity, rej)re-
sents different grades of doctrine respecting his nature, ranging
all the way from Semi-Arianism down to the mere human Chiist
of Socinianism.
The issue against the doctrine of the Holy Spirit, as embodied
RKsrKCTiNo i" ^^^c doctrine of the Trinity, is in the denial of both
THK SPIRIT. his personality and divinity, but mostly the former.
But if the Spirit is not a person, neither can he be divine \\\ r.ny
sense necessary to the doctrine of the Trinity. The forms of
this antagonism may be more conveniently brought into vie v.',
so far as necessary to this discussion, when treating the doc-
trine of the Spirit in its relation to the Trinity. Enough has
already been stated to show that the questions respecting both
the Son and the Spirit are vital to this doctrine. Without the
' Matt, iii, 17 ; John xvii, 24. = John i, 14, 18.
'■'John iii, If) ; Rom. viii, 32 ; 1 John iv, 10.
QUESTIONS OF THE TRINITY. 225
personal distinction of the Son and the Spirit from the Father, and
the essential divinity of each, there is for theology no question of
the Trinity.
3. Union of the Three in Divitie Unity. — This is the question
of harmony in the constituent facts of the Trinity, and, as pre-
viously noted, the very difficult question of the doctrine. It is the
point which the adversary mostly assails. The defense is not in a
clear philosophy of the doctrine, for there is no such a philosophy.
For our reason the unity of God in Trinity is a mystery. There
is, however, a profound difference between a mystery and a con-
tradiction. The latter is utterly incredible, while the former may
be thoroughly credible, as many mysteries are. The ground of
strength of the doctrine for Christian faith lies in its thk doctrine.
sure Scripture ground, and not simply in the completeness of its
constituent facts as therein given, but especially in its complete ar-
ticulation with the cardinal truths of Christianity. With the
strength of this ground, we simply require such a statement of the
facts as shall at once be sufficient for the doctrine and yet place
them above all contradictory opposition. With this attainment, the
assaults of the adversary are futile.
It is not assumed that such a statement is easily made. The
difficulties are serious, though we do not think them ^^,, r..^...,
' ~ REALDIPFI-
insuperable. For speculative thought the ground seems cilty of the
narrow between unitarianism, on the one hand, and
tritheism, on the other. This is the real difficulty. In the treat-
ment of the question there are not wanting instances in which this
middle ground is lost, sometimes on the one side, and sometimes on
the other. The predication of both unity and plurality in exactly
the same view of God is a contradiction, and there must be error
respecting either the unity or the plurality. God cannot be one
person and three persons in the same definite sense of personality.
Hence there must be a ground of unity below the trinal distinction
of persons, or personality in this distinction must be held in a quali-
fied sense. If we find a ground of unity below personality we must
still confront the question whether such ground will answer for the
unity of God as given in the Scriptures. Whatever the qualifica-
tion in the sense of personality, it must still remain sufficient for
the trinal distinction of persons, while the unity and the trinality
must not be in contradictory opposition. Otherwise there is no
question of the Trinity. The necessary elements of the doctrine
disappear, with the result of either unitarianism or tritheism. It
may thus be seen that we have not disguised the difficulties of the
question.
16
226 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
II. Treatment of the Trinity.
1. I}icipic)icji/ of the Doctrine. — In speaking of this incipiency
we distinguish between a doctrine as formally wrought out in
Christian thought and the elements of the doctrine which are given
in Scripture, but given simply as elements, not in doctrinal syn-
thesis. The cardinal doctrines of Christian theology are mostly
the construction of Church councils — councils less or more general
in their representation. But the incipiency of a doc-
BEGINNINO IN » . , , » -i /-^l • i
iNr>ivii»iA I tnuG ever anticipates the work oi a council, tertainly
MINDS. ^jjjg jg ^j,^^g respecting all the leading doctrines of Chris-
tian theology. As the elements of such a doctrine are given in the
Scriptures they must be taken np into the thought of the religious
teachers, and through their ministry become the thought of the
Church. There are always minds of such philosophic cast that
they will study the elemental truths in their scientific relation, and
seek to combine them in doctrinal form. Thus it is that leading
doctrines of theology have ever taken form more or less definite
in individual minds. Such is specially the case respecting the
doctrine of the Trinity. The Scriptures are replete with truths
respecting the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit. These
truths are specially central to the salvation in Christ and the life
in the Spirit, and must therefore have been in the daily thought of
the Church. Thus through the vital interest of its elemental
truths the doctrine of the Trinity soon began to take form, espe-
cially in leading minds. Such a process is always hastened, and
was specially in this instance, by the incitement of dissident opin-
ions which are regarded as harmful errings from the truth. There
was such a preparation for the work of the great council which con-
structed the doctrine of the Trinity. Indeed, in this case the
groundwork had received a definiteness of form, as in the Apos-
tles' Creed, which scarcely appears in the preparation for any other
leading doctrine.
2! Tlie Great Trimtarian Creeds. — There are three creeds which
may properly be designated as great: the Apostles', the Nicene, the
Athanasian. Formulations of the same doctrine follow in the sym-
bols of different Churches, but mostly they are cast in the molds
of these earlier creeds, which have continued to shape the doc-
trinal thought of the Church upon this great question. Yet only
one of these creeds has a clear historic position in respect to its
original formation. The Apostles' is not an apostolic production,
and must be dated from a later period. The Athanasian is later
than the time of Athanasius, but doubtless received much of its
TREATMENT OF THE TRINITY. 227
inspiration and cast from his teaching on this great question. It is
mostly an amplification of the Nicene Creed, in the formation of
which Athanasius had so large a part, and was probably a work of
the school of Augustine. This is the more prevalent opinion.'
3. Content of the Creeds. — The position of these creeds in the
history of doctrines, and their determinative work in this central
truth of Christian theology, may justify a very free citation, partic-
ularly from the Niceue and Athanasian. In no other way can we
place the doctrine of the Trinity more clearly before us.
The Apostles' Creed is so familiar that citations may be omitted,
particularly as it contains nothing which is not equally
^ . „ T . 1 ,1 1 ^ THE APOSTLES'.
or more lully expressed m the others.
The Nicene: "We believe in one God, the Father Almighty,
Maker of all things visible and invisible.
TH F NiCENE
."And in one Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of God,
begotten of the Father, Light of Light, very God of very God, be-
gotten, not made, being of one substance with the Father; by whom
all things were made.
" And in the Holy Ghost."
The mere declaration of faith in the Holy Ghost made no ad-
vance beyond the Apostles' Creed, and was quite insufficient for a
doctrine of the Spirit either in the full sense of the Scriptures or as
required for a doctrine of the Trinity. The question was thus left
in a very unsatisfactory state. It was too great a question, and too
intimately related to the doctrine of the Trinity, for the indiffer-
ence of the Church. Agitation followed. Ojoposing views were
advocated. Error flourished. The truth was not so definitely
formulated or placed in such commanding position that the better
thought of the Church might crystallize around it. It was need-
ful, therefore, that a doctrine of the Spirit should be formulated for
its own sake, and also for the completion of the doctrine of the
Trinity. The Council of Constantinople was convened, A. D. 381,
for this purpose. Some additions were made to the doctrine of the
Son, which, however, it is not important here to note. The doc-
trine of the Spirit is given thus:
"And [we believe] in the Holy Ghost, the Lord and Giver of
life, who proceedeth from the Father, and with the Father and the
Son together is worshiped and glorified, who spake by the proph-
ets."
This addition was held to complete the doctrine of the Trinity,
and is often viewed simply as a part of the Nicene Creed.
' Pearson : Exposition of the Creed ; Schaff : Creeds of Christendom, vols, i,
pp. 14-41, ii, pp. 45-71 ; Shedd : History of Doctrines, vol. i, pp. 306-375.
2_>S SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
The Athanasian Creed, while not the formation of any Church
THE ATHA- council aucl of unknown authorshij), has yet been quite
NAsiAN. j^g influential and authoritative on the doctrine of the
Trinity as any other. Hence it is proper to cite from this creed
also.
" And the Catholic faith is this : That we worship one God in
Trinity, and Trinity in Unity; neither confounding the persons,
nor dividing the substance. For there is one Person of the Father ;
another of the Son ; and another of the Holy Ghost. But the God-
head of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost, is all
one ; the Glory equal, the Majesty co-eternal. ... So the Father
is God : the Son is God : and the Holy Ghost is God. And yet
there are not three Gods : but one God. . . . The Father is made
of none : neitlicr created, nor begotten. The Son is of the Father
alone : not made, nor created : but begotten. The Holy Ghost is
of the Father and of the Son : neither made, nor created, nor be-
gotten : but proceeding. . . . And in this Trinity none is afore, or
after another : none is greater, or less than another. But the whole
three Persons are co-eternal, and co-equal. So that in all things,
as aforesaid : the Unity in Trinity, and the Trinity in Unity, is to
be worshiped.''
It would be easy to cite many highly ai)2:)reciative views of this
iTSPROMi- creed. Hagenbach says :" The doctrine of the Church
NENCE. concerning the Trinity appears most fully developed
and expressed in its most perfect symbolical form in what is called
the Symbolum ([uicunqxie (commonly, but erroneously, called the
Creed of St. Athanasius). It originated in the school of Augustine,
and is ascribed by some to Vigilius Tapsensis, by others to Vin-
centius Leriuensis, and by some again to others. B}^ the repetition
of positive and negative propositions the mysterious doctrine is
presented to the understanding in so hieroglyphical a form as to
make man feel his own weakness. The consequence Avas that all
further endeavors of human ingenuity to solve its apparent contra-
dictions by philosophical arguments must dash against this bul-
wark of faith, on which salvation was made to depend, as the
Avaves against an impregnable rock.'"
These great creeds give their own doctrinal contents. It would
be difficult, perhaps impossible, to find woi'ds more definite or ex-
plicit for the expression of the same truths. The history of doc-
trinal expression on this great question confirms this view. Few
subjects have more deeply engaged the thought of the Church. Xot
only have great synods profoundly studied and carefully formulated
' History of Doctrines, vol. i, pp. 288, 289.
TREATMENT OF THE TRINITY. 229
the doctrine, but all along the Christian centuries the most learned
and gifted theologians have given to the subject the highest powers
of discussion and expression which they could command. The
success has been in the measure of accordance with the great creeds.
Any thing less must lose some element of the doctrine ; any thing
more must bring the constituent truths into discord.
4. The Doctrinal Result. — The creeds are simply a careful state-
ment and combination of the elements of truth which
A KORMDLA-
constitute the doctrine of the Trinity. There is no tion-, not a
solution of the doctrine for our reason. This was not '""■^o^ophy.
attempted, and could not have been attained. The human mind
to which the whole subject of the Trinity seems clear surely does
not see it at all. Difficulties must arise with any close study of the
doctrine, and the more as the study is the profounder. We should
no more disguise or deny them than attempt a philosophy of the
Trinity. We previously pointed out the central difficulty of the
question. It is in finding between unitarianism and tritheism sure
and sufficient ground for the doctrine of the Trinity. However
sure the several truths of the doctrine as given in the Scriptures, it
must yet be admitted that for speculative thought this middle
ground is seemingly but narrow and not very real. If we posit for
the Trinity one intelligence, one consciousness, one will, seemingly
we are very close upon unitarianism. If, on the other hand, we
assume for each personal distinction all that constitutes personality
as directly known to us, we seem equally close upon tritheism. The
real difficulty is in finding the whole truth of the Trinity between
these extremes ; and we have again brought it into notice, not for
any solution, but rather as a caution against attempting a philos-
ophy of the doctrine.
Such perplexities were present to the minds most active in the
formation of the great creeds. This is manifest in the careful
selection and use of terms for the expression of the truths combined
in the doctrine of the Trinity ; particularly in the qualified sense
of personality, that it might be at the same time consistent with
the unity of God, on the one hand, clear of tritheism, on the other,
and yet sufficient for the trinal distinction of persons in the sense
of the doctrine. This was their high aim ; which, however, is far
short of a philosophy of the doctrine. They sought to avoid con-
tradictory statements ; and to this they did attain. They neither
denied the unity of God nor asserted three Gods, but did most
explicitly deny the latter and assert the former. The trinal dis-
tinction of persons implies no division in the essential being of God.
The unity of his being is guarded and preserved in most explicit
230 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
terms. There is in the doctrine no distinct nature for each person
of the Trinity. The distinction is of three personal subsistences in
the unitary being of God.
" What then is this doctrine ? It is that God is one being in
such a modified and extended sense of the language as
to include three persons in such a modified and re-
stricted sense of the terms that he is qualified^ in a corresponding
restricted sense, for three distinct divine personal forms of phenom-
enal action. Now what presumption is furnished by this doctrine
against its truth ? Does it assert that one God is three Gods, or
that there are more Gods than one? It admits of no such construc-
tion, for it expressly affirms that there is but one God, and that
the three persons, as persons, are not three beings or three Gods.
Does the doctrine then exclude from the conception of God the
ordinary, necessary phenomenal conception of a being ? So far
from it, that in asserting that God is one being, it includes this
conception. Does the doctrine then include more in the concep-
tion of God as one being than is comprised in the ordinary, neces-
sary phenomenal conception of being ? But allowing this, what
presumption does it afford against the truth of the doctrine ? AVhat
shadow of evidence can the mind of man discover that the eternal,
self-existent God should not subsist in a mode peculiar to himself,
and quite diverse from that of creatures ? Rather, what evidence
can man possess that nothing more enters into the full and true
conception which is formed by his own infinite mind of himself than
is comprised in the ordinary, phenomenal, and very limited con-
ception which man forms of the same being ? What evidence has
man, or can he have, that this limited phenomenal conception of
his own being comprises all that is true, and all that God, who
made him, conceives and knows to be true ? If there is nothing
like evidence to his mind that more is not, in this respect, true of
himself, what presumption can there be that more is not true of the
self-existent God, even that which constitutes three persons in one
God ?"' We have not cited this passage as an explication of the
doctrine in the light of reason. This is not really its aim, though
the author had more faith in such a possibility than we have. The
passage is admirable as a defense against much of the hostile
criticism which the doctrine encounters, and it is for this rea-
son that we have cited it. It not only successfully defends the
doctrine against the accusation of contradictory opposition in the
facts which constitute it, but clearly points out the extravagant
pretension to a knowledge of being, even of the divine Being,
' Taylor : Revealed Theology, pp. 54, 55.
TREATMENT OF THE TRINITY. 231
necessary on the part of any one who denies the possibility of the
divine Trinity.
With this effective defense against hostile criticism, difficulties
for our reason still remain. In the lesson of these
RESOTTRPE OP
difficulties we may still learn the unwisdom of attempt- christian
ins; a philosophy of the Trinity. The chief resource of thought and
FAITH
Christian thought and faith is in a close adherence to
the several truths of the Trinity as given in the Scriptures. The
constituent elements of the doctrine are clearly given therein, but
simply as truths, not with any explication. The incomprehensi-
bility of the doctrine is only one of many incomprehensibilities in
God. In the trinal distinction of persons in the Trinity, person-
ality itself must not be interpreted too rigidly after the notion of
our own. In this notion personality is an instance of the purest
unity, and a distinction of persons is simply a distinction of such
unities, with complete individuality in each. But while we are
created in the image of God, we are not individually the measure
of his Being. Hence a trinality which might well seem contra-
dictory to unity in man may yet be consistent with unity in the
plenitude of God. Any warranted denial of such a possibility as
much transcends our reason as a philosophy of the Trinity, because
only a comprehensive knowledge of the being of God could warrant
such a denial on rational ground.'
' Schaff : Creeds of Christendom, vol. i, chap, ii ; Harvey: History and The-
ology of the Three Creeds ; Shedd : Histoi-y of Christian Doctrine, book iii ;
Cunningham : Historical Theology, vol. i, chaps, iii, ix ; Hagenbach : History
of Doctrines, vol. i, pp. 258-290 ; Sir Peter King : The Apostles' Creed; Forbes :
The Nicene Creed / Waterland : The Athanasian Creed, Works, vol. iii.
2S3 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
CHAPTER VI.
THE SON OF GOD.
As previously noted, the essential divinity of the Son is a neces-
sary element in the doctrine of the Trinity. Hence this doctrine
is vitally concerned in the question of the Sonship, and requires
KiLiATioxoK for it a ground in the divine nature. If the full sense
THK SOX. of filiation is given in the miraculous conception of
Christ, or in liis Messianic offices, there is no truth of the Sonship
Buflicient for the doctrine of the Trinity. If, on the other hand,
filiation respects the personality of the Son in a higher nature than
the human, it must include the sense of an essentially divine Son-
ship. The indefinitenesG of Semi-Arianism respecting the higher
nature of tlie Son may properly rule it out of any issue on this
question. As Arianism holds the Son to be a creation of God, it
allows no true sense of filiation respecting his higher nature. Crea-
tion is not a mode of the truest filiation. Certainly Arianism can-
not give the filiation of the Son in the sense of the Scriptures. It
follows that the issue of this question, as it resj^ects the nature of
the Son, is solely between the divine sense of the Nicene Creed and
the mere human sense of Socinianism. If there be a filiation of
the Son in a higher sense than the latter, it must be in the full
sense of the former. It thus appears that the filiation of the Son
so vitally concerns the doctrine of the Trinity as to justify its
treatment separately from the more direct question of his divinity.
If, however, the Scriptures clearly give the higher sense of the
former, so far they affirm the latter.
I. Doctrine of the Sonship.
1. Fatherhood and Sonship. — The divine Fatherhood is in its
deepest sense purely correlative with the filiation of the Son;
though in a lower sense it is vastly broader. God is " the Father
of spirits," ' and in a sense inclusive of all intelligences. This
broader relation, however, is simply from creation, and its real
meaning is the loving care of God for his rational creatures, such
as a father cherishes for his children." There is still the profound
distinction between a Fatherhood through generation, as in relation
'Heb. xii. 9. » Psa. ciii. 13.
DOCTRINE OF THE SONSEIP. 233
to tlie Son, and a Fatherhood on the ground of creation, as in rela-
tion to men and angels. Christian sonship through regeneration,
or being ''born of God," ' rests on the deeper ground, and signi-
fies the fullness of the Father's love for his spiritual children. The
divine Fatherhood, even in relation to the divine Son, should have
a special depth of meaning for us through the fatherly and filial
relations in our own life.
The Fatherhood of God in relation to the Son is bo frequently
expressed in the Scriptures, and must so fully appear in the treat-
ment of the Sonship, that it requires no separate statement.
2. Lower Sense of Filiation. — A lower and a higher sense is a
very common fact in the use of words. It appears in such cardinal
terms of theology as redemption and atonement. In no such case,
however, does cither sense exclude the other, unless they be in
contradictory opposition. Hence the Nicene doctrine of the Son-
chip has no dialectic interect in denying a lower sense of filiation.
If a proper exegesis gives such a sense of Scripture, it is simply
a result to be accepted; and if such an exegesis gives the higher
sense, it is none the less true on account of the lower, because the
two are in no opposition. The filiation of the Son as expressed in
Scripture is not always in the exclusive sense of his divinity.''
Sometimes the more direct reference is to a lower ground. Such
is the case in the salutation of the angel to Mary.' Hero is the
announcement of the miraculous conception and birth of a holy
child who should be called " the Son of God." We would not
even here deny to this formula the sense of essential divinity. The
profound truth cf the incarnation forbids it. But in this instance
the Son of God is the Son incarnate, and the filiation must in-
clude the human nature with the divine ; and, while the meaning
transcends the human, the more direct reference is still to a fili-
ation through the miraculous conception of Christ. It thus seems
clear that the filiation of the Son is not always in the exclusive
sense of his divine nature.
Sometimes the Sonship has more direct reference to the Mes-
sianic and kingly offices of Christ." The sense of a gQ,^ ^g ^es-
divine filiation may be present even here; but as the ^'^h-
Son fulfills these ofiices through his incarnation and exaltation in
our nature, the filiation must include this lower element. This
psalm is clearly the seed of other passages of like import. In one
it is declared that the promise of God unto the fathers was ful-
filled unto their children in the resurrection of Clirist.' Reference
' John i, 12, V6. " Pearson : On the Creed, art. ii.
' Luke i, 31-35. * Psa. ii, 7-12. " Acts xiii, 32. 33.
234 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
is made to the secoiul psalm, with a citation of the words, "Thou
art my Son; this day have I begotten thee." The resurrection of
Christ may here mean his advent as the Messiah. But if taken in
the ordinary sense, the filiation of Christ simply through his resur-
rection would give a very narrow sense of the text; but oven if the
true one, it would have no doctrinal consequence against the higher
sense of filiation, which, without any contradiction to the lower,
would still securely stand in other texts of Scripture. In a truer
view, the resurrection of Christ is not in itself a filiative fact, but
a central fact in proof of his Messiahship and kingly power," and
thus represents a filiation inclusive of these elements. This is the
same sense of filiation as given in the second psalm.
'Tor unto which of the angels said he at any time, Thou art
mv Sou, this day have I begotten thee?" "So also
PR 1 K sTLv Christ glorified not himself to be made a high-priest;
OFFICES. -^^^^ i^g ^l^g^^ g^l^ ^^^^^ ^j^^^ Thou art my Son, to-day
have I begotten thee."^ The sense of Sonship in these texts is
much the same as in the second psalm, from which they are in-
formal citations. The mere citation, however, does not determine
the sameness of the meaning. The sense of this day or to-day,
which relates to the filiation, may not be easily determined. It must
be either indefinite or definite in meaning. If the former, it has
no time-limit and means an eternal filiation; if the latter, as first
uttered it must have been prophetic of some future fact or facts
which contain the lower sense of filiation. If the exegesis of these
texts should hold us rigidly to the sense of a temporal filiation,
fulfilled in the kingly and priestly offices of Christ, it would simply
place them in accord with texts previously noticed, and without in
the least affecting the truth of an eternal Sonship as given in others.
In the coming of the end, or in the consummation, the Son shall de-
liver up the kingdom to the Father, and shall himself be subject to
the Father, that God may be all in all.' There is a relative subor-
dination of the Son in the doctrine of the Nicene Creed; but there is
here a surrender of functions and a subjection of the* Son Avhich
find their fulfillment only in connection with Messianic or kingly
offices. Powers of government were vested in Christ, the incarnate
and redeeming Son. All power in heaven and in earth was given
to him.'' To him was committed the office of judgment; and he
shall finally judge all men." He was exalted in Headship over the
Church, and in Lordship over the angels; and it was the Son in-
carnate, the Christ in our nature, in whom such powers of goveru-
' Rom. i, 4. - Heb. i, 5 ; v, 5. '1 Cor. xv, 34-28.
matt, xxviii, 18. ='John v, 22; Acta xvii, 31; 2 Cor. v, 10; 2 Tim. iv, 1.
DOCTRINE OF THE SON SHI P. 235
ment were invested.' In the consummation the Son will deliver
np the kingdom and be subject to the Father with respect to these
powers of his mediatorial office, which will then have been fulfilled.
Thus all that appears as temporal in respect to the Son appertains
to his mediatorial office, and is without any contrary opposition to
his own eternal Sonship.
3. A Divine So7is7iip. — A full treatment of the divine Sonship
would anticipate much that properly belongs to the more direct
question of the divinity of Christ. But as the proof of the latter
must confirm the truth of the former, there is the less occasion for
its full treatment as a separate question.
"The Son," as this name is placed in the formula of baptism,
must be both a personal and a divine being. ^ His asso-
ciation with the Father m this sacrament can mean la of bap-
nothing less. To deny the personality of the Son is to ^'^*''
preclude all rational account of baptism in his name. To deny his
divinity is equally preclusive of any rational interpretation. We
have previously shown that Arianism allows no ground of filiation
in Christ higher than his human nature. Hence if we deny a divine
filiation of the Son as the sense of the baptismal formula, there re-
mains no higher ground of Sonship than the human nature of Christ.
"We are brought down to the low ground of Socinianism. Can such
a doctrine explain the association of the Son with the Father in the
sacrament of baptism? Can it give any sufficient reason for the
baptism in the name of the Son? Baptism signifies the remission
of sins, the regeneration of the moral nature, and the initiation of
the soul into the kingdom of grace. Hence when the risen Lord,
invested with all power in the kingdom of God, charged his apostles
with the great commission, " Go ye therefore and teach all nations,
baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the
Holy Ghost," his words must mean a personal agency of the Son, as of
the Father, in the great works which the baptism signifies, and an
agency to which only divinity itself is equal. Hence the filiation of
the Son must be in the sense of essential divinity.
The true doctrine of the Sonship appears in a conversation of
Christ with the Jews, in which he defends himself
f , _ 1 N H I S O W N
against the charge of violating the Sabbath by a miracle words of fil-
of mercy wrought upon that sacred day.' For his vin- ''^''''*^'^-
dication he claims for himself a perpetual work of providence in
co-operation with the Father : "My Father worketh hitherto, and
I work." There was a definite work of creation from which the
' Eph. i, 20-23 ; Phil, ii, 9-11 ; 1 Pet. iii, 22.
« Matt, xxviii, 19. ^ Jq^u y^ 1Q-2S.
236 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
Father rested, but his providential agency in the maintenance of the
universe ever continues. In this agency the Son ever works with
the Father. With these words the Jews were intensely offended.
In their minds Christ had not only broken the Sabbath, but had
said also that God was his Father, making himself equal with God.
In this crimination thoy might have emphasized the association of
himself with the Fatlier in the work of his providence, which clearly
implies an equality with God. The Jews were not authorities in the
interpretation of the words of Christ. However, they could express
their own sense of his meaning ; and this is all that concerns ns
here. With this fact the noteworthy point is, that in no sense does
Christ question or correct their inference, that the Sonship which he
asserted for himself implied an equality with God. The rather do
his further words confirm their interpretation. We may specially
note the conclusion. "For the Father judgeth no man, but hath
committed all judgment unto the Son : that all men should honor the
Son, even as they honor the Father." "Whatever form that honor
may take, be it thought, or language, or outward act, or devotion of
the affections, or submission of the will, or the union of thought
and heart and will into one complex act of self-prostration before
infinite Greatness, which we of the present day usually mean by the
term adoration, such honor is due to the Son no less than to the Fa-
ther. How fearful is such a claim if the Son be only human ; how
natural, how moderate, how just, if he is in very deed divine." ' The
filiation of the Son as set forth by himself in this self-vindication
must contain the sense of essential divinity.
The creative v.'ork of the Sou is conclusive of a divine filiation.
i.\ HIS WORK '^^^^ Word by Avhom all things were made^ is not the
OK CREATION, rcasou or creative energy of God in a mere attributive
sense, and personified in the work of creation, but a divine person.
The personality is clearly given in the identification of the AVord
with the incarnate Son: "And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt
among us, (and wc beheld his glory, the glory as of the only begotten
of the Father,) full of grace and truth.'" " The only begotten of
the Father " ever means the Son of God. The Son is the AVord.
The AVord is personally and essentially divine. This is the truth of a
divine Sonship. A revelation of the same truth through the creative
work of the Son is given with equal clearness and fullness in other
texts of Scripture. The Son through whose blood we have redemp-
tion and remission of sins is the Creator of all things.^ Hence the
Sonship must antedate the incarnation and the Messiahship of
' Lidtlon : Our Lord^s Divinity, p. 182.
*Johu i, 1-3. :'Johu i, 14. ■• Col. i, 1:5-17.
DOCTRINE OF THE SONSHIP. 237
Christ. In the text under notice it is declared to antedate all cre-
ated existences. Again, it is declared that the Son by whom God
has spoken unto men in the times subsequent to the prophets is the
Maker of worlds and the Upholder of all things.' In the sense of
these texts there is a divine Sonship. The filiation of the Son is not
in its deepest sense through the supernatural generation of his
human nature, nor on the ground of his Messianic offices, nor by
the creative act of God, but by an eternal generation in consub-
stantiality with the Father,
4. Generation of the t>on. — There are repeated utterances of
Scripture which express or imply the generation of the Son. He
is "the only begotten of the Father;" "the only begotten Son;"
"■ the only begotten Son of God." ^ On the ground of these words of
Scripture, generation is in proper theological use for the expression
of a fact distinctive of the Son in the doctrine of the Trinity. It
requires no forced interpretation to read out of the words of St.
Paul, "Who is the image of the invisible God, the first-born of
every creature," ' the same distinctive fact of generation respecting
the Son. "As the ehoov, Christ is the TZQiordroKog -ndGrjg Krlaeixiq:
that is to say, not the first in rank among created beings, hut begot-
ten before any created beings. That this is a true sense of the ex-
pression is etymologically certain; but it is also the only sense which
is in real harmony with the relation in which, according to the con-
text, Christ is said to stand to the created universe."'' The dis-
tinction of the Son from the created universe is profound. His
existence is, not by creation, but by generation, and before all cre-
ated existences. Not only is he distinguished from all creatures in
the mode of his own existence, but is himself the Author of all
creation." With these determining facts of distinction, " the first-
born of every creature" — Trpwroro/fo^ Txdarjq Kriaeojg — cannot be
classed with created existences either as first in the order of time or
as highest in the order of rank. The Son is born or begotten of
God before creation and time.
The fact of generation is peculiar to the Son in the personal dis-
tinctions of the Trinity. There is no sense of genera- c.kkvratio:^
tion respecting either the Father or the Holy Spirit. pkci:liarto
The ground of the fact as distinctive of the Son is given
in the Scriptures, but without any explanation. But as the Script-
ures give the distinctive fact they warrant the use of generation as
a theological term. The use of the term, however, is rather for
doctrinal expression than for any explication of the doctrine. The
1 Heb. i, 2, 3. ' John i, 14, 18 ; iii, 16, 18 ; 1 John iv, 9.
»Col. i, 15. ••Liddon : Our Lord's Divinity, p. 318. * Col. i, 16, 17.
238 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
creeds state the fact of generation very much as the Scriptures do,
and without any advance toward an explanation. The words of the
Nicenc Creed are: " The only begotten Sou of God, begotten of the
Father before all worlds, God of God, Light of Light, very God of
very God, begotten, not made, being of one substance with the
Father; " of the Athanasian: " The Son is of the Father alone: not
made, nor created: but begotten ... of the substance of the Father;
begotten before the worlds."
If the generation of the Son is for us an insoluble mystery, still
it may be ijuarded against erroneous interpretation.
GUARDED USE . . . .
OF GEN Ell A- This is necessary to preserve its consistency with other
'^'"^' elements in the doctrine of the Trinity. Two or three
points may be specially, though briefly, noted.
The generation of the Son must exclusively respect his personal-
ity, and in no sense his nature. The communication of the divine
nature, and of the whole divine nature, to the Son, as also to the
Holy Spirit, is a form of exi)ression very current in the Trinitarian
discussion subsequent to the Nicene Council, and still continues in
substance, if not so much in more exact form. The aim was at
once to guard the unity of the divine nature and yet to assert in the
fullest sense the divinity of tlie Son. The aim was according to
truth, and therefore good. Still the method of the aim may be
questionable. The communication of the divine nature to the Son
naturally implies his previous personal existence without this nat-
ure, and that his divinity is the result of the communication. Yet
this Avas not the intentional meaning, and it would be entirely false
to the doctrine of the Trinity. The seeming error is avoided
by holding the generation of the Son simply and exclusively in
relation to his personality. In the progress of the Trinitarian
discussion this came to be the definite view of the question.
As a personal subsistence in the divine nature, and in posses-
sion of divine attributes, the Son is divine in the deepest sense of
divinity.
Generation must not be interpreted in any close analogical sense.
As the Sonship is eternal, it cannot be the result of any
ANALOGICAL dcfiuitc dlviuc act, such as a creative or providential act.
ixTERi'RETA- Sucli au act must be in time, and its product of tem-
TION. , . .
poral origin. We should thus determine for the Son an
origin in time. Further, such a personal divine act must in the
nature of it be optional, and hence might not be at all. Therefore
the Son might never have been. These implications are utterly
contradictory to the divine predicables of the Son, and therefore a
temporal and optional generation cannot be the truth. In this
DOCTRINE OF THE SONSHIP. 239
profound mystery we can account the generation of the Son only
to an eternal and necessary activity of the divine nature.
5. Consiihstantiality ivitJi the Father. — The sense of consubstan-
tiality is that the essential being of the Son is neither different in
kind nor numerically other than the substance of the Father, but
the very same. This doctrine was formally decreed by the Coun-
cil of Chalcedon : " We, then, following the holy fathers, all with
one consent, teach men to confess one and the same Son . . .
bfioovoLov r(2 TzaTQi Kara rrjv 6e6ri]ra — consubstantial with the Father
according to the Godhead."' The definition was intended to be
most exact. The council used bjioovoLog in sharp discrimination
from oiioiovaiog, which means a distinct substance, and may mean a
substance lower in kind. Both Arianism and Semi-Arianism were
thus excluded, while the true and essential divinity of the Son was
affirmed.
6. Doctrine of Suhordination. — In the divine economies of re-
ligion, particularly in the work of redemption, there is a subordi-
nation of the Son to the Father. There is, indeed, this same idea
of subordination in the creative and providential works of the Son.
However, the fullness of this idea is in the work of redemption.
The Father gives the Son, sends the Son, delivers up the Son, pre-
pares a body for his incarnation, and in filial obedience the Son
fulfills the pleasure of the Father, even unto his crucifixion." The
ground of this subordination is purely in his filiation, not in any
distinction of essential divinity.
II. Divinity of the Son.
This is a question of revelation. The faith of the Church even
from the beginning affirms its truth. But we must go ^ troth of
back of this faith, and back of all formulations and scripture.
creeds of councils, to the Scriptures themselves as the only au-
thority in Christian doctrine. An exposition of all the texts, or
even most of the texts, which concern the divinity of our Lord
would require an elaboration running into a volume. This method
is entirely proper in a separate or monographic treatment of the
question, but is neither the usual nor the better method in a course
of doctrinal discussions. Nor is it necessary to a conclusive argu-
ment for the divinity of Christ. A summary grouping and appli-
cation of Scripture proofs may give the argument in a conclusive
form, and with a strength against which the fallacies of logic and
the perversions of exegesis are powerless.
' Schaff : Creeds of Christendom, vol. ii, p. 63.
"^ John iii, 16, 17 ; Rom. viii, 33 ; Psa. xl, 6-8 ; Heb. x, 5-7 ; Phil, ii, 8.
240 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
The priuciple in wliich this argumeut maj'be grounded underlies
all science. Every thing is for science what its own
METHOD OK • • i ml • i
THE AR(;c- qualities determine it to be. This law must rule the
^^^^' classifications of science in all realms of existence.
Otherwise no science is possible. In the crudest forms of matter,
in the spheres of cliemistry, botany, zoology, in the realms of in-
tellectual and moral life, every thing must be for science what its
own distinctive qualities determine it to be. The same principle is
equally valid for theology. It must be valid for theology, because
it is the necessary and universal ground of rational and cognitive
thinking. Hence, if it is not true in all si^heres that existences
are what their distinctive facts determine them to be, it cannot
be true in any. With such a result, mind would sink far below
skepticism into the starkest nescience. As, on this necessary and
universal law, gold is gold by virtue of its determining facts, so God
is God by virtue of the essential and distinctive facts of divinity.
There is for thought no other law of differentiation between the
Unite and the Infinite, or between things and God. The prin-
ciple is equally valid in the question of the divinity of Christ. If
the Scriptures in an unqualified sense attribute the essential facts
of divinity to the Son, then on the ground of their authority and
in the deepest sense of the term he is divine.
It may thus be seen that the strength of the argument for the
THE ARGu- divinity of Christ may be given without any great elab-
MENT. oration. Proceeding on the principle which we have
laid down, all that is required is a grouping of the essential and
distinctive facts of divinity as clearly attributed to Christ in the
Scriptures. These facts may be classed under four heads : titles,
attributes, works, worshipfulness. There is nothing novel in this
division or grouping of these facts. It is so simple and advanta-
geous that it has been very customary, and in this sense is the pre-
scriptive method.
1. Divine Titles. — There are titles which in their primary or full
sense are expressive of divinity and belong only to God. Yet such
titles are given in the same sense to the Son.
God is such a title. It is at once expressive and distinctive of
fion A DIVINE divinity. This is none the less true because it is not
TiTLK. always used in this higher sense. Even in the Script-
ures the term is often applied to idols.' It is not necessary to mul-
tiply references. This name is given also to princes, magistrates,
and judges.'' In this lower sense Moses was a god: "And the
Lord said unto Moses, See, I have made thee a god unto Pha-
' Exod. xxii, 20 ; Judg. xi, 24. •' Exod. xxii, 28 ; Psa. Ixxxii, 1, G.
DIVINITY OF THE SON. 241
raoli."' Even Satan himself is called god — " the god of this world. "^
In all these instances, however, the partial or figurative nse of the term
is open and clear. Idols are gods as representing the objects of
heathen worship. Princes, magistrates, judges are gods as the
ministers of God in government, or as exercising functions in some
likeness to the divine agency. Moses was a god to Pharaoh as the
minister and representative of God himself. Satan is a god as
exercising a ruling power over the world. Such a qualified use of
terms is very common, and without any effect upon the primary or
full meaning. In this higher sense God is still the expressive and
distinctive title of divinity. As in the beginning God created the
heaven and the earth ; ' as God is great and doeth wondrous things,
and he only is God ; * as God is the only object of supreme wor-
ship,* so is the term expressive and distinctive of divinity.
In this higher sense Christ is God, and therefore divine. It may
suffice to adduce a few instances. "And many of the thesontri-lv
children of Israel shall he turn to the Lord their God." ° «od.
This is the mission fulfilled by John as the forerunner of Christ.
Unto him the hearts of many were turned ; and he it is who is
called " the Lord their God." This application is confirmed by the
words immediately following : " And he shall go before him in the
spirit and power of Elias, to turn the hearts of the fathers to the
children, and the disobedient to the wisdom of the just ; to make
ready a people prepared for the Lord." There is no restricted or
qualified sense of the divine name in this use of it. Any issue
would be joined, not against the deepest sense of the term, but
against its application to Christ. Such an issue, however, must
concede the fullest sense, because there is no other possible reason
for denying its application to him. With this concession, we need
but point again to the clear and full proof of this application. It
is thus true that Christ is God in the deepest sense of divinity.
" In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and
the Word was God." ' In the fourteenth verse of this chapter the
Word is identified with the personal Son in the incarnation. The
Son is the Word, and the Word is God. There is no limitation of
the term in this application to the Son. There is no reason in the
connection for any limitation, but conclusive reasons for its deepest
sense. The eternity and creative work of the Son, as here clearly
given, justify his designation as God and require its deepest sense
for the expression of his nature.
" And Thomas answered and said unto him. My Lord and my
'Exod. vii, 1. 2 0 Cop, jy, 4. 'Gen. i, 1. " Psa. Ixxxvi, 10.
^Matt. iv, 10 ; Rev. xxii, 9. *Luke i. 16. ' John i, 1.
17
•J 42 8VSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
God."' Thomas not only refused faith in the resurrection of
FrRTiiER TKs- Christ simplj on the testimony of his brother-disci-
TiMONY. p]eg^ but demanded the sight of liis own eyes and the
touch of his own fingers in a definitely specified manner." Christ
freely offered him all that ho required. Then it was, as Christ
stood before him in living form and with all the required tokens of
his identity, that Thomas addressed him in these words of adoring
faith : " My Lord and my God." It is easy to declare these words
a mere ejaculation, addressed to God the Father, if to any one. If
addressed to no one, they must have been profane, and therefore
could in no sense have received the approval of Christ. A mere
ejaculatory rendering is not consistent with the temper of Thomas.
Besides, the words themselves are definite respecting the person ad-
dressed : '' And Thomas answered and said unto him " — unto Jesus
— " My Lord and my God." Eliminate from these words the sense
of adoring worship, and they become profane. They were not pro-
fane, for Thomas received the approval and blessing of Christ in
their use. So sure is it that he is God in the deepest sense of the
term.
" Take heed therefore unto yourselves, and to all the flock over
TKSTiMONY wliicli the Holy Ghost hath made you overseers, to feed
OK PAUL. the (!hurch of God, which he hath purchased with his
own blood."' So Paul addressed the elders of the church in
Ephesus, whom he met at Miletus. We know that some dispute
the genuineness of Qeov in this text, and would replace it with
Kvptoy; but the preponderance of critical authority is strongly in
favor of the former. As Christ is frequently called God in the
Scriptures, and often by St. Paul himself, such an application of
0e6f is nothing against its genuineness in this text. In all fair-
ness, it must stand with the preponderance of critical authority.
It is an instance in which, in the deepest sense of the term, Christ
is called God. '' Whose are the fathers, and of whom, as concern-
ing the flesh, Christ came, who is over all, God blessed forever.
Amen."^ St. Paul had just been enumerating the great privileges
LiDDON's of Israel. '' To these privileges he subjoins a climax.
KXKGKsis. I'l^e Israelites were they, ef u)v 6 XQiardg to Kara odpKa,
b u)v f-.TTi TrdvTMv Otof evXoyrjrdg elc; Tovg aiwvat;. It was from the
blood of Israel that the true Christ had sprung, so far as his hu-
man nature was concerned; but Christ's Israelitic descent is, in
the apostle's eyes, so consummate a glory of Israel, because Christ
is much more than one of the sons of men, because by reason of
his higher pre-existent nature he is ' over all, God blessed for-
' John XX, 28. ^Jobnxx, 25. » Acts xx, 28. "Rom. ix, 5.
DIVINITY OF THE SON. 243
ever,' This is the natural sense of the passage. If the passage
occurred in a profane author and there were no antitheological
interest to be promoted, few critics would think of overlooking the
antithesis between XpioTog to Kara oaqna and Qeo^ ev/^oyrjrdg. Still
less possible would it be to destroy this antithesis outright, and to
impoverish the climax of the whole passage, by cutting off the
doxology from the clause which precedes it, and so erecting it into
an independent ascription of praise to God the Father. If we
should admit that the doctrine of Christ's Godhead is not stated in
this precise form elsewhere in St. Paul's writings, that admission
cannot be held to justify us in violently breaking up the passage,
in order to escape from its natural meaning, unless we are prepared
to deny that St. Paul could possibly have employed an dna^
Xeyojievov. Nor in j)oint of fact does St. Paul say more in this
famous text than when in writing to Titus he describes Christians
as ' looking for the blessed hope and appearing of the glory of our
great God and Saviour Jesus Christ, who gave himself for us." '
Here the grammar apparently, and the context certainly, oblige us
to recognize the identity of ' our Saviour Jesus Christ ' and ' our
great God.' As a matter of fact. Christians are not waiting for
any manifestation of the Father. And he who gave himself for
us can be none other than our Lord Jesus Christ." " This citation,
while addressed more directly to the proof of Christ's divinity, is
conclusive of our specific point in proof of the same truth, that
in the profoundest sense he is called God.
"But unto the Son, he saith. Thy throne, 0 God, is forever and
ever: a scepter of righteousness is the scepter of thy kingdom."^
In this connection the subject is the greatness of the Son, and the
particular view, his greatness above the angels. He has a higher
inheritance and name than they. ^ No one of them is ever styled,
as the Son himself, the begotten Son of the Father. The Son is
their Creator and Euler, and the object of their supreme worship.
They are servants and ministering spirits, while the Son is en-
throned in the supremacy of government. He is God. The facts
call into thought the words of the prophet: " For unto us a child
is born, unto us a son is given: and the government shall be upon
his shoulder: and his name shall be called Wonderful, Counselor,
The mighty God, The everlasting Father, The Prince of Peace.' *
When the incarnate Son is thus called God, it must be in the sense
of his divinity.
Jehovah is a distinctive name of the Deity. It is also a Scripture
• Titu3 ii, 13, 14. ^ Liddon : Our Lord's Divinity, pp. 313-315.
3 Heb. i, 8. * Isa. ix, 6.
244 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
appellation of the Son, and therefore a proof of his divinity. God
jKHovAH A made known this name to Moses in a manner which
DiviNK TiTi.K. emphasizes its profound meaning. "And God spake
imto Moses, and said unto him, I am Jehovah: and I appeared
unto Abraliam, unto Isaac, and unto Jacob, by the name of God
Almighty; but by my name Jehovah was I not known to them.'"
It is restrictively the name of God: "That men may know that
tliou, whose name alone is Jehovah, art the Most High over all the
earth. ^' '^ It is the expression of an infinite perfection and inalien-
able glory: "I am the Lord [Jehovah]; that is my name: and
my glory Avill I not give to another, neither my praise to graven
images." ' In the plenitude of its meaning this name signifies the
eternal and immutable being of the Deity.
There is nothing in the combination of this name with terms of
finite import which contradicts or even modifies its pro-
ITSTTSK
IN coMBiNA- found meaning. Hence it is groundless to object,
'''"''^' " that it is sometimes given to ijlacea. It is so; but
only in composition with some other word, and not surely as indic-
ative of any quality in the places themselves, but as memorials
of the acts and goodness of Jehovah himself, as manifested in
those localities. So ' Jehovah-jireh, in the mount of the Lord it
Bhall be seen,' or, 'the Lord will provide,' referred to His inter-
position to save Isaac, or, probably, to the provision of the future
sacrifice of Christ."' There is no use of this term in combination
with others which restricts or modifies its profound meaning as the
distinctive and expressive name of the Deity.
This name is given to the Son, and in the fullness of its meaning
THE SON IS ^s ^ divine title. The Scriptures open with the name
JEHOVAH. of God in plural form. These terms may have in
themselves but little force for the proof of the Trinity; but as seen
in the light of a fuller revelation of God they properly anticipate
the personal distinctions in the theophanies of a later period. In
these theophanies there are the personal designations of Jehovah
and the Angel of Jehovah. The same person appears, sometimes
with the one title, sometimes with the other, and in some instances
with both, and with the distinctive facts of divinity. A few refer-
ences will verify these statements.' The Angel of Jehovah, as re-
vealed in these theophanies, is a divine person. The powers
which he exercises and the prerogatives which he asserts are dis-
' Exod. vi, 2, 3. ' Psa. Ixxxiii, 18. ' Isa. xlii, 8.
■* Watson : Tncoloijical Institutes, vol. i, p. 506.
* Gen. xvi, 7-13 ; xvii, 1-22 ; xviii, 1-33 ; xxii, 1-18 ; xxviii, 10-22 ; xxxii,
24-30, with Hosea xii, 3-5 ; Exod. iii, 2-15.
DIVINITY OF THE SON. 245
tinctive of the Deity. Yet when styled Jehovah it is clearly with
personal distinction from the Father. He cannot be the Angel of
Jehovah and Jehovah the Father at the same time; though he
can be Jehovah the Son and the Angel of the Father, This is the
sense of these thcophanies as we read them in the light of later
revelations, especially in the clear light of the New Testament.
The Angel of Jehovah, the Jehovah of these theophanies, is the Son
of God. " The angel, who appeared to Ilagar, to Abra-
CJ-' DRHODT'F
ham, to Moses, to Joshua, to Gideon, and. to Manoah,
who was called Jehovah and worshiped as Adonai, who claimed
divine homage and exercised divine power, whom the psalmists and
prophets set forth as the Son of God, as the Counselor, the Prince
of Peace, the mighty God, and whom they predicted was to be
born of a virgin, and to whom every knee should bow and every
tongue should confess, of things in heaven, and things in earth,
and things under the earth, is none other than lie whom we now
recognize and worship as our God and Saviour Jesus Christ. It
was the Aoyof daaQKoq whom the Israelites worshiped and obeyed;
and it is the Aoyof tvaapKog whom we acknowledge as our Lord and
God." ' This is the summation after a full review of the relative
facts; and the facts fully warrant the conclusion.
''From all that has been said, it is now manifest on how great
authority the ancient doctors of the Church affirmed
that it was the Son of God who in former times, under
the Old Testament, appeared to holy men, distinguished by the
name of Jehovah, and honored by them with divine worship. . . .
He who appeared and spoke to Moses in the burning bush and on
Mount Sinai, who manifested himself to Abraham, etc., was the
Word, or Son, of God. It is, however, certain that he who ap-
peared is called Jehovah, I am, the God of Abraham, of Isaac, and
of Jacob, etc., titles which clearly are not applicable to any created
being, but are peculiar to the true God. And this is the very rea-
soning which the fathers all employ to prove that in such mani-
festations it was not a mere created angel, but the Son of God,
who was present ; that the name of Jehovah, namely, and divine
worship are given to him who appeared ; but that these are not
communicable to any creature, and belong to the true God alone ;
whence it follows that they all believed that the Son was very
God."^ This is the conclusion of the learned author from a thor-
ough treatment of the appropriate texts, and after a thorough review
of the Antenicene fathers, with free citations from their writings.
' Hodge : Systematic Theology, vol. i, p. 490.
' Bishop Bull : Defense of the Nicene Creed, book i, chap, i, 30.
24t5 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
It is clear tluit the argument for the divinity of Christ, as thus
KcopK OK THK constfucted, goes far beyond the fact that he is called
ARficMKNT. Jehovah in its deepest sense as a title of the Deity. In
the divine manifestations of Jehovah, the Son, in the earlier rev-
elations of God, he appears in the possession of divine attributes
and prerogatives, performs divine works, and receives supreme wor-
Khiji, He is called Jehovah in the deepest sense of the term, and
this fact is in itself the proof of his divinity. That he is thus
called Jehovah is clear in the texts of the theophanies, previously
given by reference.
. 2. Divine Attributes. — The more exact analysis and classification
of the attributes, as previously treated, may here be omitted. Such a
method would prove a hinderance to the simplicity of the argument,
without adding any thing to its strength. Certain divine pred-
icables which we treated as true of God and distinctive of divinity
are equally true of the Son, and as conclusive of his divinity as the
possession of the divine attributes which are distinctively such.
As the words, " In the beginning God created the heaven and the
earth," ' infold the truth of his absolute eternity, so the
words, "In the beginning was the Word. . . . All
things were made by him,"^ infold the truth of the absolute eter-
nity of the Son. There are more explicit utterances of the same
truth. The Sou is Alpha and Omega, which is, and which was,
and which is to come ; the first and the last ; the beginning and
the end.' In these predicates of the Son we have an informal cita-
tion from Isaiah : ''Thus saith the Lord the King of Israel, and
his Redeemer the Lord of hosts ; I am the first, and I am the last;
and besides me there is no God."* No proper interpretation is pos-
sible in either case without the absolute eternity of the subject of
Buch predication.
The Son by an immediate insight knew all men, even their most
secret thoughts and deeds ; ^ searches the reins and the
heart of men." A close and keen observer may ac-
quire a pretty clear insight into the character of one with whom he
is in daily intercourse. Yet even in this case the interior active
life, the thoughts, desires, aspirations are hidden from the sharp-
est gaze. The knowledge of Christ infinitely transcends all the pos-
Bibilities of such knowledge. It has no limitation to such facts as
are in some mode expressed, but apprehends the most secret life.
Nor is it in the least conditioned on any personal acquaintance or
special study, but is an immediate and perfect insight into the most
' Gen. i, 1. 'John i, 1-3. 'Eev. i, 8, 17; xxii, 13.
■• Isa. xliv, 6, * John ii, 24, 25. « Rev. ii, 23.
DIVINITY OF THE SON. LM 7
secret facts of the life ; and not only of one man, or of a few famil-
iar friends, but equally of all men. " Lord, thou knowest all
things; thou knowest that I love thee,"' is the witnessing of
Peter to his immediate knowledge of the inmost life of men.
"Now we are sure that thou knowest all things,"" is the testi-
mony of the disciples to his omniscience. The same truth receives
the very strongest expression in the words of our Lord himself:
"As the Father knoweth me, even so know I the Father."^ The
infinite depth of such a knowledge of the Father is possible only
with omniscience. This may suflfice for the present, as the same
truth must re-appear in treating the final judgment of all men as the
work of Christ.
HoYvTiver, we must not entirely omit an objection which is ever
at hand with those who dispute the divinity of our Lord.
•'■ '' SEEMINGLY, A
This objection is based on his own words — whether re- contrary
specting the destruction of Jerusalem or the final judg-
ment concerns not the present question : " But of that day and hour
knoweth no man, no, nor the angels which are in heaven, neither
the Son, but the Father."" In the discussion respecting the divin-
ity of Christ these words have been much in issue. This appears in
the repeated and persistent efforts of the fathers to bring the text
into harmony with that doctrine, or, at least, to obviate all dis-
proof of it. All along the Christian centuries the champions of the
Kicene Creed have taken up the question for the same purpose. In
his masterly work on the divinity of our Lord, Canon Liddon re-
news the endeavor with all the resources of his rare ability and
learning. Seemingly, little remains to be added on this side of
the question. Indeed, this has been the case for a long time.
The genuineness of the text has been questioned, or, at least, the
question has been raised, but that genuineness has not attempted
been discredited. It has been attempted to obviate solutions.
the difficulty by rendering the words as relating to the Son, in the
sense of not making known, instead of not knowing. This, how-
ever, is purely arbitrary, and inadmissible. Man, the angels, and
the Son, as disjunctively placed in the text, stand in precisely the
same relation to the one verb, oldev. If, with the negative term,
we render this verb in the sense of nescience in relation to man and
the angels, and then abruptly change to the sense of not making
known in relation to the Son, the transition is so arbitrary that
laws of interpretation must forbid it. Further, if ov8s 6 vlog
(oldev) means that the Son doth not reveal or make known, then
el iirj b TTaT'qp (oldev) — words which immediately follow — should mean
' John xxi, 17. '' John xvi, 30. ^ John x, 15. * Mark xiii, 33.
24« SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
that the Father iloth make known. This, however, would contra-
dict the phiiii sense of the text. The only escape from this con-
tradiction would require another abrupt transition back to the sense
of the verb in its relation to man and the angels. There is no light
in this view.
Mostly, a solution of the question has been attempted on the
LEAniN(; ground of a distinction between the divine and the
ATTKMPT. human consciousness of Christ. On this ground it is
assumed that, while as God he knew the time of the judgment, as
man he did not know it. This is the method of Athanasius him-
self, and for it he claims the consensus of the fathers. The great
defenders of the Nicene Creed are mostly in his following. Canon
Liddon joins them.' We specially refer to him because he is among
the most recent and most able upon this question, as also upon
the whole question of the divinity of Christ. Of course, the assumed
distinction between the divine and the human consciousness of
Christ is open to the pointed criticism that it is inconsistent with
the unity of his personality in the union of his divine and human
natures. In the terse putting of Stier, ''Such knowing and not
knowing at the same time severs the unity of the God-human
person, and is impossible in the Son of man, who is the Son indeed,
but emptied of his glory. "^ Seemingly, such a distinction involves
the doctrinal consequence of Nestorianism, in which the human
nature of Christ is a distinct human person, in only sympathetic
union with the divine Son. It is a rather curious fact that, for the
explication of a perplexing text, so many truly orthodox in creed
should make a distinction in the consciousness of Christ which
seems like a surrender to the Nestorian heresy. Of course, this is
not intended. There are, indeed, many facts in the life of Christ
which seemingly belong to a purely human consciousness ; but if
they are made the ground of a distinct human consciousness the
same Nestorian consequence follows. Such facts lie within the
mystery of the incarnation, where they unite with the facts of
divinity manifest in Christ. The personality of Christ must be
determined, not from any one class of facts, whether human or
divine, but from a view of both classes as clearly ascribed to him in
the Scriptures.
What is the result? The perplexity arising from this text is
not obviated by any of the methods previously noticed.
THE RFSULT •/ »/ x •/
Nor is there any method by which this result can be
attained. Any inference from this fact that Christ is not divine
' Our LorcVs Diviniti/, pp. 458-464.
' The Words oj the Lord Jesus, vol. iii, p. 296.
DIVINITY OF THE SON. 249
would be hasty and unwarranted. The many conclusive proofs of
his divinity still remain in the Scriptures. The subordination of
these many proofs to one seemingly adverse text would, for its
method, be against all the logic of science and all the laws of bibli-
cal exegesis. That text must remain as a perplexity for our exege-
sis, and may remain without any weakening of our faith in the
divinity of our Lord.
As this attribute must be clearly manifest in treating the works
of Christ, a very brief statement may suffice here. He
has absolute power over nature. This is manifest in
many of his miracles. In the feeding of thousands to satiety with
a few loaves and fishes, in giving sight to the blind and hearing to
the deaf, in raising the dead, in calming the storm, we see the ef-
ficiencies of omnipotence in its absoluteness over all the forces of
nature. By his mighty power he is able to subdue all things to
himself.' He upholds all things by the word of his power. ^ He is
the Almighty.' Such attributions of power and agency can be
true of Christ only on the ground of his true and essential omnip-
otence.
Eespecting the attributes of Christ, one truth is given in another
truth. The truth of his omnipresence is given in the
truth of his universal providence, which has already
appeared in the fact of his upholding all things by the word of his
power, and will further be shown in a more direct treatment. The
providence of Christ is through his personal agency, in all the
realms of nature. That personal agency is the reality of his om-
nipresence in its truest, deepest sense — an omnipresence in the in-
finitude of his knowledge and power. We may cite two promises
of Christ, which can receive no proper interpretation without the
truth of his omnij^resence. " For where two or three are gathered to-
gether in my name, there am I in the midst of them. " * These words
are in the form of assertion, as of a fact, but with the sense and
grace of a promise. The fact is of his presence with all who meet
in his name, wherever and whenever it may be. As a promise of
grace, his presence means a personal agency for the spiritual bene-
diction of his worshiping disciples. Again, when he commissioned
his apostles for the evangelization of all nations, he said, " Lo, lam
with you alway, even unto the end of the world. Amen." ° Again
the words in form assert the fact of his presence, but in the sense
and grace of a promise. The fact of his presence is for all his min-
isters, in all the world and for all time, as for his chosen apostles
' Phil, iii, 31. ^ Heb. i, 3. 'Eev. i, 8.
^ Matt, xviii, 20. ^ Matt, xxviii, 20.
OMNIPRKSKNCE.
250 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
whom he immediately commissioned to tlie work of evangelization.
As a promise of grace, it is for all true ministers of Christ, as for
the apostles, an assurance of his helpful agency. He seals this as-
surance with his own "Amen." Only an omnipresent Being —
omnipresent with the infinite efficiencies of a personal agency —
could truthfully assert such facts and give such promises.
Mutations of estate with the divine 8on are the profoundest.
He was rich, and became poor; ' in the form of God,
with an equal glory of estate, but divested himself of
this glory and assumed instead the form of a servant in the likeness
of men, and humbled himself even to the death of the cross; and
again he was exalted of the Father in Lordship over all intelli-
gences." 8till, there is the deep truth of his immutability. "Jesus
Christ the same yesterday, and to-day, and forever;"' immutable
in divine personality through all his mutations of estate. As
pointed out in treating the immutability of God, its strongest and
Bublimest expression is given in the words of the psalmist.* Yet
these very words, without any variation affecting their sense, or any
qualification, are applied to the Son: "And, Thou, Lord, in the
beginning hast laid the foundation of the earth; and the heavens
are the works of thine hands. They shall perish, but thou remain-
est: and they shall wax old as doth a garment; and as a vesture
shalt thou fold them up, and they shall be changed: but thou art
the same, and thy years shall not fail." " If the reality of immuta-
bility is expressible in words, it is expressed in these words. Then
the Son of God is immutable.
The possession of the attributes of eternity, omniscience, omnip-
otence, omnipresence, and immutability, as thus grounded in the
truth of Scripture, concludes the divinity of Christ.
3. Divine Wor^s. — There are works of such a character that
they must be as expressive of divinity in the personal agency which
achieves them as the possession of its essential and distinctive
attributes. Does Christ perform such works? This question we
must carry into the Scriptures. They will not leave us in any
reasonable doubt as to the truth in the case.
The Scriptures open with the creative work of God. With sim-
plicity of words, the lofty tone at once lifts our thoughts
to the infinite perfections of his being. In the begin-
ning God created the heaven and the earth. And God said, Let
there be light: and there was light. And God said. Let there be
lights in the firmament of heaven; let the earth bring forth grass
' 2 Cor. viii, 9. ' Pbil. ii, eV-11. ^ Heb. xiii, 8.
• Psa. cii, 25-27. * Heb. i, 10-12.
DIVINITY OF THE SON". 251
and herb and fruit-tree, and let the waters bring forth abundantly
the moving creature that hath life: and it was so.' Verily God is
God. Creation is his work; the expression of his infinite perfec-
tions. The same truth runs through all the Scriptures. The
heavens declare his glory, and the firmament showeth his handi-
work.^ God who made the world and all things therein, he is
Lord of heaven and earth. ^ His works of creation reveal his eternal
power and Godhead."
Creation is the work of Christ. A few texts may suffice for this
truth. ''All things were made by him; and without
=■_ J ' CREATIVE
him was not anything made that was made.^'^ The work op
Word who was in the beginning with God, and was
God, and is in the fourteenth verse of this chapter identified with
the incarnate Son, he it is who created all things. Futile is the
attempt to resolve this work of creation into a moral renovation of
the world. The words of John are go much like the opening words
of creation in Genesis, to which one's thought is immediately carried,
that only an original creation will answer for their full meaning. ' ' For
by him were all things created, that are in heaven, and that are in
earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones, or dominions, or prin-
cipalities, or powers: all things were created by him, and for him.""
It is the Son of God, as the connection determines, who is thus
declared the Creator of all things. ISTo admissible in- j-rj-ation in
terpretation can eliminate from this text the idea of its deepest
an original creation — a creation of all things in the
sense in which the Scriptures ascribe their creation to God. The
notion of setting things in order, or of a moral renovation^ is utterly
precluded by the amplification of the text. If the former sense
were admissible, very little would be gained even for an Arian
Christology; nothing certainly for the Socinian. A setting of all
things in order could mean nothing less than the reduction of
chaotic materials into cosmic forms, and the collocation of worlds
so as to secure the order of systems and the harmonies of the nni-
verse. God only is equal to such a work. There is the same in-
evitable implication, if Avith the text we carry up the thought to all
higher intelligences, even to thrones and dominions, principalities
and powers. Any limitation to an institutional ordering, as in
the Christian economy, is senseless for this text. The amplification
includes in the creative work of Christ all things in earth and
heaven, visible. and invisible, material and rational, all the ranks
and orders of celestial intelligences. This is infinitely too broad
' Gen. i, 1-20. ■ Psa. xix, 1. » Acts xvii, 24.
* Rom. i, 20. ^ John i, 3. « Col. i, 16.
252 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
and higli for any institutional work of a merely human Christ. In
the deepest meaning of the term, and with limitless comprehension,
the Son is the creator of all things. The words of Bishop Bull are
not too strong for this sense of the text: " But if these words of
the apostle do not speak of a creation, properly so called, I should
believe that Holy Scripture labored under inexplicable difficulty,
and that no certain conclusion could be deduced from its words,
however express they might seem to be."' We add a single text,
without comment: "And, Thou, Lord, in the beginning hast
laid the foundation of the earth: and the heavens are the work
of thine hand."*
These three texts prove the creative work of Christ. " If God
the Father were here substituted for Christ, no man would ever
think of denying that the work of creation is attributed to him in
the most proper sense."' The creative work of Christ is conclu-
sive of his divinity.
The question of a divine providence is not here to be treated
any farther than in application to the present argu-
PROVIDENCE J- -i. A o
mcut. There is a i^rovidence of God which is conserva-
tive of all existences, material and rational. "^ Lif t up your eyes
on high, and behold who hath created these things, that bringeth
out their host by number; he calleth them all by names by
the greatness of his might, for that he is strong in power; not
one faileth."^ The preservation of all worlds in their orderly ex-
istence is thus revealed as the work of a divine providence, and
classed with the work of their creation. In the monotheism which
St. Paul preached to the men of Athens on Mars' Hill there is the
same creative work of God, only with broader comprehension, and
the same providence in the preservation and government of his
works.' Here again the work of providence is classed with the
work of creation. God only can preserve and rule the works of his
hands.
Such a work of providence is ascribed to the Son. After that
remarkable passage, previously cited, in which the creation of all
things is attributed to him, it is added: "And he is before all
things, and by him all things consist."" Here the providence of
the Son in the preservation of all things is classed with his work in
their creation, just as in the texts previously noticed the preserv-
ing providence of God is classed with his creative work. " Up-
holding all things by the word of his power " ' strongly expresses
' Defense of the Nicene Creed, book i, chap, i, 15. '' Heb. i, 10.
•" Wood : Works, vol. i, p. 351. ■* Isa. xl, 26. '•> Acts xvii, 22-28.
"Col. i, 17. 'Heb. i, 3.
DIVINITY OF THE SON. 253
the providence of the Son. He sustains all things, and rules them
in an orderly manner. "By the word of his power" signifies a
personal agency of infinite efficiency. In a like manner the per-
sonal agency of God in creation and providence is expressed.' So
by the word of his power, his immediate, omnipotent personal
agency, the Son upholds all things, and rules them in an orderly
manner. In the providential work of the Son there is the truth of
his divinity.
It is the clear sense of Scripture, and the common unperverted
moral judgment, that God only can forgive sin, in its forgiveness
strictly ethical sense. Yet Christ forgave sin in the "f sin.
deepest sense of divine forgiveness." This is decisive proof of his
divinity.
The theory of the resurrection does not concern the present ar-
gument. There is in the Scriptures the doctrine of a
O ... ■WORK OB' THE
final, general resurrection of the dead. This is a great resurrec-
work of the future — so great as to suggest a doubt of its ^'°^"
possibility. The sacred writers neither deny its greatness nor at-
tempt to modify the sense of the resurrection, so as to obviate the
objection. Instead of this, they make answer simply by appealing
the question to the infinite power of God.' The resurrection is a
great work to which God only is equal ; but he is equal to its
achievement. This is their only answer. Yet it is the explicit
truth of Scripture that Christ by his own power shall raise the
dead." If God only can accomplish this work, Christ, who shall
accomplish it, must possess the infinite efficiencies of God, and,
therefore, must be divine.
The final judgment must be perfectly righteous both in its decis-
ions and rewards. It must be such respecting every ^ixal judg-
person judged, and respecting every moral deed of ^''•''"'•
every person. For such a judgment, a perfect knowledge of every
life, even in its every moral deed, is absolutely necessary. Every
life in its constitutional tendency and exterior condition, in all its
susceptibilities and allurements, in its most hidden thoughts and
feelings, motives and aims, must be perfectly known. There must
be such knowledge of each individual life, and of every life of all the
generations of men. There is such knowledge only in omniscience.
If we might compare works, each of which requires an infinite agency,
the final judgment is a greater one than the general resurrection.
Not all the divine teleology in the construction of the universe re-
quires a more absolute omniscience. Yet that final judgment is the
• Gen. i, 3 ; Psa. xxxiii, 6, 9. ' Luke v, 20-24.
3 Matt, xxii, 29 ; Acts xxvi, 8. •* John v, 28, 29 ; Phil, iii, 21.
254 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
work of the Son. This is an ex[)licit truth of the Scriptures.' We
have given only a few references out of many. What we have given
are of themselves suliicient for the truth which they so cleaj-ly ex-
press. The Son of God who shall finally judge all men must be
omniscient, and, therefore, truly and essentially divine.
Each of the works of Christ, live in number, which wo have
brought into the argument is conclusive of his divinity. In their
combination the argument is irresistible.
4. Divine Worshipfidness. — God only is supremely worshipful.
Such worship consciously rendered to any lower being is idolatry.
Many texts of Scripture witness to these truths. Eeference to a
few may suffice.''
Christ claims and receives supreme worship. It is divinely com-
supREMELY maudcd. The Scriptures witness to these truths, as a
woRsiiiPEi). few texts may show.
" The Father judgeth no man, but hath committed all judg-
ment to the Son : that all men should honor the Son, even as
they honor the Father. He that honoreth not the Son honor-
eth not the Father which sent him."' In the connection Christ
speaks of God as his Father in a sense expressive of his own
divinity. So the Jews understood him. He offers no correc-
tion, but proceeds with words replete with the same truth. He
is co-operative with the Father in the perpetual work of his provi-
dence, and ever doeth the same things which the Father doeth.
Such words lead up to the rightful claim of a supreme worshipful-
ness with the Father, as expressed in the words which we have
cited. Men honor the Father only as they supremely Avorship him.
Yet it is made the duty of all men to honor the Son, even as they
honor the Father. " And again, when he bringeth the first begot-
ten into the world, he saith. And let all the angels of God worship
him.'"* Only a supreme worship of the incarnate Son can fulfill
the requirement of this command.
In many instances of jprayer and forms of religious service supreme
INSTANCES OF worshlp is rendered to Christ. In filling the place in
THE WORSHIP. i\^Q apostolate made vacant by the treason of Judas
the apostles "prayed, and said. Thou, Lord, which knowest the
hearts of all, show whether of these two thou hast chosen. " *
Stephen in the hour of his martyrdom prayed, " Lord Jesus, receive
my spirit," and also prayed for his murderers, " Lord, lay not this
sin to their charge. " ° Thrice did Paul beseech the Lord for the
' Matt. XXV, 31-46 ; John v, 22 ; 2 Cor. v, 10.
2 Exod. XX, 3-5 ; Isa. Ixii, 8 ; Matt, iv, 10 ; Rev. xix, 10.
' John V, 22, 23. •" Heb. i, 0. ^ Acts i, 24. « Acts vii, 59, 60.
DIVINITY OF THE SON. 255
removal of that thorn in the flesh, that buffeting messenger of
Satan.' The connection shows that it was the Lord Jesus to whom
he thus devoutly and persistently prayed. "The grace of the
Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God, and the communion of
the Holy Ghost, be with you all. Amen."' This benediction
is the devout prayer of Paul for the divine gift of the largest
spiritual blessings to the members of this Church. For these
blessings he prays to the Lord Jesus, just as he prays to God the
Father. Only a divine being could bestow such blessings. No
other could be associated with the Father in such a supplication by
one so fully enlightened in Christian truth as St. Paul. No such
prayer could be truly offered except in a spirit of devout and su-
preme worship. Thus did Paul worship the Lord Jesus in this
prayer. In two given instances he prays in like manner for the
church in Thessalonica.' As Paul thus prayed, so did the other
apostles pray, and so did the saints in every place call upon the
name of the Lord Jesus. ■* To deny them the spirit of a devout
and supreme worship of Christ in these prayers is to accuse them
of superstition or idolatry.
Christ is exalted and enthroned in supreme lordship and wor-
shipfulness over saints and angels. He is seated on the g,^ worshipkd
right hand of God, far above all principalities and ^-"^^ hkaven.
powers, while all are made subject to him." To him is given a
name which is above every name, that at the name of Jesus every
knee should bow, and every tongue should confess that he is Lord. "
There shall thus be rendered to him the supreme homage which
God in most solemn form claims of all.'' As this homage is claimed
of God, and due to him only because he is God, Christ must be
truly divine ; for else it could not be claimed for him. Yet, even
angels and authorities and powers are made subject to him, and
must render him supreme homage." If Christ is not supremely
worshipful, Christianity becomes a vast system of idolatry for both
earth and heaven. He is supremely worshiped. There is such
worship in the grateful and joyous doxology : "Unto him that
loved us, and washed us from our sins in his own blood, and hath
made us kings and priests unto God and his Father ; to him be glory
and dominion for ever and ever. Amen." ° He is supremely wor-
shiped in heaven. Even the angelic hosts join in this worship,
saying, " Worthy is the Lamb that was slain to receive power, and
'3 Cor. xii, 7, 8. 23 Cor. xiii, 14.
3 1 Thess. iii, 11-13; 2 Thess. ii, 16, 17. ■'I Cor. i, 3.
'Eph. i, 20-33. >* Phil, ii, 9-11. Usa. xlv, 32, 23.
« 1 Pet. iii, 23. » Eev. i, 5, 6.
L'56 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
riches, and wisdom, and strength, and honor, and glory, and bless-
ing." The strain is prolonged : " Blessing, and honor, and glory,
and power, be unto him that sitteth upon tlie throne, and unto the
Lamb for ever and ever.'" If in this adoring service the Father
is supremely worshiped, so is the Son. His supreme worshipful-
uess is the proof of his divinity.
The unqualified ascription of the distinctively divine titles, attri-
butes, works, and worshipfulness to the Son is conclusive of his
true and essential divinity, as the sense and doctrine of the Holy
Scriptures. The proof is in the highest degree cumulative and
conclusive.
' Rev. V, 12, 13.
General reference. — Athanasius : On the Incarnation ; Burton : Testimonies
of the Antenicene Fathers to the Divinity of Christ ; Pearson : Exposition of the
Creed, article ii ; Waterland : Defense of the Divinity of Christ ; A Second De-
fense of ChrisVs Divinity, Works, vol. ii ; Princeton Essays, essay ii, " The Son-
ship of Christ ; " Whitelaw : 7s Christ Divine ? Perowne : The Godhead of Jesus,
Hulsean Lectures, 1866 ; Liddon : Our Lord''s Divinity, Bampton Lectures, 1866.
PERSONALITY OF THE SPIRIT. 25 :
CHAPTER VII.
THE HOLY SPIBIT.
The questions requiring special attention in the present discus-
sion are the personality and the divinity of the Holy Spirit. Both
questions involve necessary elements in the doctrine of the Trinity.
Both must have sure ground in the Scriptures, or this doctrine
cannot be maintained. The history of doctrines shows a per-
sistent disputation of both ; yet their Scripture ground remains
clear and sure. After the conclusive proof of the per- closely re-
sonality and divinity of the Son, objections to the per- lated ques-
sonality and divinity of the Holy Spirit have the less
weight. The two questions are so one in their deepest ground
that mere rational objections must be the same against both.
Hence, as all such have spent their force and proved themselves
powerless against the former, they are already proved groundless
against the latter. In a word, the conclusive proof of the distinct
personality and essential divinity of the Son clears the way for the
Scripture proof of the distinct personality and essential divinity of
the Holy Spirit. However, in this case particularly, the two ques-
tions of personality and divinity require separate treatment.
I. PERSOlSrALITY OF THE SPIRIT.
1. Determinmg Facts of Personality. — These facts were suf-
ficiently given in our discussion of the divine personality. As in
all instances the same facts are necessary to personality, and in all
determinative of personality, a reference to the previous discussion
may here suffice.
2. The Holy Spirit a Person. — The Scriptures are replete with
references to the Spirit, the Spirit of God, the Spirit references
of Christ, and the Holy Spirit. This reference is in to the
the first chapter of the Bible and in the last. But it
is not necessary, nor would it be judicious or wise, to assume in
every such instance a personal distinction of the Spirit in the sense
of Trinitarianism. It suffices for the doctrine that there are suf-
ficiently numerous texts which give the sense of this distinction,
and which cannot be rationally interpreted without it. There are
enough such ; even many above the need. The clearer texts are in
18
258 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
the New Testament, but there are many in the Old which, espe-
cially as read in the light of the New, give the same meaning.
In the brooding of the Spirit upon the face of the waters, bring-
FACTs OF PER- i^g cosmic forms out of the chaotic mass; ' in the striv-
soNALAOENcv. [ng of thc Spirit with men;'' in his gift of wisdom to
Bezaleel and Aholiab, ^nd to other artisans of special skill;' in
his illumination and guidance of Othniel, the son of Kenaz, in the
leadership and government of Israel, securing to them the conquest
of their enemies, and rest for forty years; ' in giving a pattern of
the temple to David — a pattern which he gave to Solomon; ' in the
gracious baptism of Christ, as foretold in prophecy and fulfilled in
the Gospel,' — in all these operations, as in many others like them,
there are forms and qualities of agency which clearly signify the
personality of the Spirit.
The association of the Holy Spirit with the Father and the Son
PERSONAL AS- ^^ ^hc form of baptism gives the sense of his own per-
sociATioxs. sonality." The personality of neither the Father nor
the Son can be questioned, so far as the meaning of these words is
concerned. Any such denial respecting the Spirit is utterly arbi-
trary and groundless. If it be not so, then the Holy Spirit must
signify some nameless impersonal energy of the Father. In this
case, baptism would be in the name of the Father, and in the name
of some indefinite form of his personal energy. So irrational a
sense cannot be read into these words of Christ. The Father
must here mean thc plenitude of his Deity. Hence baptism in
his name must be in the full sense of this plenitude. No im-
personal somewhat can remain, in the name of which baptism
may be solemnly performed, just as though it stood in the same
infinite plenitude of divinity with the Father himself. In the
form of apostolic benediction there is a like association of Fa-
ther, Son, and Holy Spirit." For like reasons we must here find
the personality of the Spirit. This benediction is not a mere form
of words, but an earnest prayer, an outbreathing of the soul in sup-
plication for the richest spiritual blessings. These blessings can be
conferred only through personal divine agency. This love of God
the Father is thc personal bestowmcnt of the gifts of his love.
This grace of Christ is the personal gift of the benefits of his
redemptive work. Hence this communion of the Spirit must sig-
nify his personal agency in our spiritual life. The personality of
the Spirit is as real as that of the Father and of the Son.
' Gen. i, 2. 'Gen. vi, 3. ^Exod. xxxi, 2-6. •» Judg. iii, 9-11.
^ 1 Chron. xxviii, 11, 12. « Isa. Ixi, 1-3 ; Lnke iv, 18-21.
■•Matt, xxviii, 19. ^2 Cor. xiii, 14.
PERSONALITY OF THE SPIRIT. 259
Tln-re are many words of Christ respecting the offices of the Spirit
which can have no rational interpretation without personal
the seiiise of his personality. The disciples were taught offices.
that, whep arraigned before magistrates, they need not be anxious
respecting their answer, for the Holy Spirit would teach them in
the same honr what they should say, and in this manner answer
for them.' Again, Christ promised the mission of the Spirit as an-
other Comforter, who should abide with the disciples, teach them
in all things, reprove the world of sin, guide the disciples into all
truth, and glorify the Son." These are strange forms of expres-
sion if the Spirit is not a person. Strictly personal terms are used,
with pronouns just as usual in other instances of personal anteced-
ents. The agency of the Spirit in the several forms of its ex-
pression is strictly personal — such as only a person can exercise.
There can be no mere personification. The facts of this agency
preclude it. The personality of the Spirit is given in these facts.
The diverse gifts of the Spirit, as expressed by St. Paul, are con-
clusive of his personality. The Spirit gives wisdom, further per-
knowledge, faith, the power of healing and working sonal offices.
miracles, of prophesying, discerning of spirits, speaking with di-
vers tongues, and interjDreting tongues.' Here again is the use of
strictly personal terms, and the expression of a strictly personal
agency. These diverse gifts signify the diverse forms of this
agency: "But all these worl^eth that one and the self -same Spirit,
dividing to every man severally as he will.^^ Nowhere has St. Paul
expressed himself in so strange a personification as this would be.
The meaning of his words cannot admit such a mode. We must
give them a strictly personal sense, and with that sense the person-
ality of the Spirit.
We may group a few significant and decisive facts. The Holy
Spirit suffers blasphemy ; ' witnesses to our gracious pjst,nctively
adoption, and helps us in our prayers;* is lied to, and person a l
resisted;" is grieved; ' is despited; ' searches and knows '''*"^'
all things; ** chooses ends and orders the means of their attain-
ment.^'^ These facts are distinctive of personality, and thus prove
the personality of the Holy Spirit. There is significance for the
present question in the very common qualitative appellation. Holy
Spirit, or Holy Ghost. This appellation occurs so frequently in
the New Testament, and is so familiar, that references are quite
iMark xiii, 11. '2 John xiv, 16, 17, 26; xv, 26 ; xvi, 8, 13, 14.
5 1 Cor. xii, 4-11. ^Luke xii, 10. ^Rom. viii, 16, 26.
« Acts V, 3 ; vii, 51. 'Eph. iv, 30. ^Heb. x, 29.
91 Cor. ii, 10, 11. '"Acts xiii, 2-4.
260 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
needless. We find it also in the Psalms and in Isaiah.' If,
instead of a personal title, we find with this appellation only a
personification, we are brought back to some indefinite energy
of God. Why should such an energy be thus specially qualified?
Holiness is distinctively a personal quality. Deeds may be holy,
but only as the deeds of a person in holy action. Even a subjective
holiness can be such only as its tendencies are to holy personal
action. Holy, as a qualitative term in the appellation of the Spirit,
must signify the personality'of the Spirit.
3. Procession of the Spirit. — With the distinction between
generation in respect to the Son and procession in relation to the
Spirit, each of which is a mystery for our thought, the treatment
of the latter is much the same as that of the former.
PROCESSION _, . T i. 1 n • •
RESPECTS Procession respects purely the personality of the Spirit,
PERSONALITY. ^^^^ ^^ ^^^ gcncration of the Son, is designated as
eternal. Procession is not from an optional act of the Father,
for this would place the origin of the Spirit in time, which is con-
tradictory to his true and essential divinity. An optional act of
the Father as original to the existence of the Spirit will answer
for Arianism or Semi-Arianism, but will not answer for the true
doctrine of the Trinity. It only remains to say that the proces-
sion of the Spirit is from a necessary and eternal activity of the
Godhead. Like other truths of the Trinity, it is inexplicable for
human thought.
The procession of the Spirit from the Father is a definite truth
of Scripture. This truth, while omitted in the Apos-
PROCESSION
FROM THE ties' Creed, was distinctly affirmed in the Nicene.
FATHER. g^ £g^j. ^Y^QYQ ^a^g jjQ reason for disputation among those
who accepted this Creed. All could agree in its affirmation that
the Spirit proceedeth from the Father, as this is so definitely
RESPECTING ^ trutli of Scriptui'e. It might still be questioned
THE FiLioQCE. wliethcr this gave the whole truth in the case. Such a
question did arise. Soon after the Nicene Council it came to be
hotly disputed whether the procession of the Spirit was from the
Father only, or from the Father and the Son. The former view
prevailed in the East; the latter in the West. A provincial Coun-
cil, convened at Toledo, A. D. 589, and representing the Western
view, added to the Nicene Creed the notable Filioque, so that the
procession of the Spirit should be expressed as from the Father
and the Son. The friends of this addition thought it a logical re-
quirement of the true and essential divinity of the Son; that if the
Son is bfioovaiog raJ Trarpt — of one substance with the Father — the
' Psa. li, 11 ; Isa. Ixiii, 10.
PERSONALITY OF THE SPIRIT. 261
procession of the Spirit must be from the Son as from the Father.
The question is thus carried into a sphere of speculation which seems
too subtle for any very positive assertion of doctrine. However,
this issue respecting the procession of the Spirit was a chief in-
fluence which led to the separation between the East and the
West, or to the division of the Church into the Greek and the Eo-
man. Evangelical Churches hold the FiUoque.
The procession of the Spirit from the Father is, as we have
stated, explicitly scriptural: ''But when the Comforter is come,
whom I will send unto you from the Father, even the Spirit of
truth, which proceedeth from the Father, he shall testify of me."'
The procession from the Son is not an explicit truth of Scripture ;
yet it is held to be derived from the Scriptures, but only in an in-
ferential mode. This mode is legitimate; and a doctrine thus ob-
tained may be as validly scriptural as if explicitly given. Many
leading doctrines are so derived; notably, the doctrine of the
Trinity, and the doctrine of the person of Christ. The only ques-
tion is whether the grounds are at once thoroughly scriptural and
conclusive of the inference. This is the vital question concerning
the procession of the Spirit from the Son.
There are certain relationships between the Father and the Spirit
which imply, and, for their full truth, require, the pro- proofs of
cession of the Spirit from the Father. But the same the filioque.
relations exist between the Son and the Spirit, which, therefore,
prove the procession of the Spirit from the Son. For the proof of
this procession, these facts of relationship must be presented. The
Holy Spirit is the Spirit of the Son, just as he is the Spirit of the
Father.'^ This fact of a common relationship seems clearly stated,
without any qualification or reserve. If it be true, as maintained
in this argument, that the Spirit is the Spirit of the Father on the
specific ground of procession, and that this is the only ground of
the relation, he must be the Spirit of the Son on the same ground.
Therefore the procession of the Spirit is from the Son, as from the
Father. This is one Scripture proof of the Filioque. Again, the
mission of the Holy Spirit in the economy of redemption is from the
Son, just as it is from the Father.^ Here also is a fact of common
relationship, clearly expressed, and without any distinction. But
the mission of the Spirit from the Father implies a subordination,
the only ground of which is in his procession from the Father.
Therefore his mission from the Son implies a subordination which
must have its ground in a procession from the Son. This is the
' John XV, 26. ' Rom. viii, 9 ; Gal. iv, 6 ; 1 Pet. i, 11.
' Jolin xiv, 16, 26 ; xvi, 7 ; Acts ii, 33.
262 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
second argument. The two give, in substance, the more direct
Scripture proof of the Filioque, or of the procession of the Spirit
from the Son.
II. Divinity of the Spirit.
The argument in this case is much the same as for the divinity of
the Son. It is grounded in the same principle, which underlies all
science, that every thing is what it is by virtue of its essential and
distinctive qualities. As on this principle we found the proof of
the divinity of the Son in his possession of the distinctive facts of
divinity, so in the same method we prove the true and essential di-
vinity of the Spirit.
1. Attributes of Divinity. — These attributes are not so fully
ascribed to the Spirit as to the Son ; yet the ascription is entirely
sufficient for the argument. If only one were so ascribed, all must
be included; for they cannot be separated. More than one is in the
ascription.
The eternity of the Spirit must be manifest in his creative agency,
which will be separately treated. It may here suffice
that the Spirit is plainly declared eternal.'
The attribute of omniscience must be manifest in the offices
which the Spirit fulfills. In the declaration of his
OMNISCIENCE
knowledge of God there is a profound expression of his
omniscience: "For the Spirit searcheth all things, yea, the deep
things of God. For what man knoweth the things of a man, save
the spirit of man which is in him? even so the things of God know-
eth no man, but the Sjiirit of God. " ' No man can know the secret
things in the mind of other men, but the Spirit searcheth and
knoweth all things. The deepest emphasis is in the fact that he
searcheth and knoweth the mind of God. The searching is the ab-
solutest knowing. This is the sense of kqevva, as the term is used
in other texts.' There is no stronger expression of an absolute om-
niscience in the Scriptures. This is the omniscience of the Holy
Spirit.
*' Whither shall I go from thy Spirit?"* is a central question in
oMNiPREs- a long passage, Avhich, in the strongest sense, expresses
KNCE. i\^Q absolute omnipresence of God. That omnipresence
is as strongly expressed by interrogation as by affirmation. The
question respecting the Spirit is in the affirmative sense of his abso-
lute omnipresence. The same truth will appear in the works of the
Spirit.
' Heb. ix, 14. » 1 Cor. ii, 10, 11.
* Eom. viii, 27 ; Eev. ii, 23. ■* Psa. cxxxix, 7.
DIVINITY OF THE SPIRIT. 263
2. Works of Divinity. — The works of the Spirit are manifold,
and of such a character that they can be possible to his agency only
on the ground of his essential divinity.
The moving of the Spirit upon the face of the waters ' signifies a
creative agency, which brought order out of chaos,
. IN CREATION
clothed the world with light, and produced the forms of
organic life.'^ The symbolical inbreathing of God into the nostrils
of Adam, as yet a lifeless bodily form, signifies an agency of the
Spirit in quickening him into life. The action of God, as figu-
ratively expressed, was in this case as the action of the risen Lord
and Saviour, when he breathed on his disciples, as a sign of the gift
and power of the Holy Spirit.' As in this case the sign-act of the
Saviour signified the agency of the Spirit as the source of their spir-
itual life and the power of their ministry, so that sign-act of God
meant the agency of the SjDirit as the original of life in Adam.
There are other expressions of the work of the Spirit in creation.
The garnishing of the heavens is his work." This carries one's
thought back to the beginning, when, as we saw, the Spirit trans-
formed t)ie chaotic mass into a cosmos. So he clothes the heavens in
their light and beauty. In respect to this world, the Spirit is ever
and every-where operative as the source of life. ^ This may suflice
for the creative work of the Spirit.* Such works are conclusive of
his divinity.
The Spirit is the source of prophetic inspiration : "■ For the
prophecy cr.-ie not in old time by the will of man : but „, kconomies
holy men of God spake as they were moved by the Holy o^ relioion.
Ghost.'" In a more specific application, the prophecies respecting
the sufferings of Christ and the glory that should follow were the
utterance of the. Spirit.* Many of his sufferings, long foretold,
sprang from free causalities in the volitions of men. Were these
the only prophecies of the Spirit, they would prove his absolute
prescience. Only an omniscient mind could unerringly predict
such events. The vastly broader scope of prophecy, comprehending
all the predictive utterances of the Spirit, deeply emphasizes the
requirement and the proof of his omniscience.
Christianity is replete with the agency of the Spirit. The Gospel,
in distinction from the law, is designated " the ministra- specially in
tion of the Spirit."' This accords with the prophecy Christianity.
of Joel and the promise of Christ respecting the fuller presence and
' Gen. i, 2. ^ Lewis : Six Days of Creation, pp. 63-67.
^ John XX, 22. "^ Job xxvi, 13. ^ Psa. civ, 30.
* Morgan : Scripture Testimonies to the Holy Spirit, pp. 5-8.
' 2 Pet. i, 21. 8 1 Pet. i, 10, 11. « 2 Cor. iii, 8.
204 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
power of the Spirit.' Fulfillment of both the prophecy and the
promise began on that memorable day of Pentecost — only began,
because this was the initiation of a fuller ministry of the Spirit
permanently distinctive of the Gospel. The outward signs which
attended this manifestation, with some extraordinary gifts, might
cease, but the presence and power of the Spirit must abide. The
life of the Church and the saving efficiency of the Gospel are in his
presence and power. Hence the agency of the Spirit in the many
forms of his operation is fully expressed in the Kew Testament.
This agency is conclusive of his divinity. "We may group a few
facts for the illustration and proof of our statements.
The saving efficiency of the Gospel is in the power of the Spirit.
This truth is in the promise of Christ to endow his disciples with
power for their work of evangelization;'' and this truth they ever
recognized and exemplified.^ It is definitely the office of the Spirit
to make the truth a convincing power in the conscience of men.'
Regeneration, that mighty transformation of the soul out of a state
of depravity into a true spiritual life, is the work of the Spirit."
Also, the Spirit is an assuring witness to the gracious adoption
and sonship attained through regeneration." All the graces of the
new spiritual life arc the fruitage of his renewing power and abiding
agency in the soul. ' Through the power of the Spirit we are trans-
formed into the image of Christ." He is a Helper and Intercessor
in all truly earnest and availing prayer;" the source of all strength
in the inner spiritual life;"* the necessary helping agency in all
gracious access to the Father." The union of believers, the unity
of the Church, is through the gracious work of the Spirit.'*'
These manifold and great works require an infinitude of personal
A DIVINE perfections. Giving efficiency to the ministry of the
PERSON. Gospel, applying the truth with convincing power to the
conscience of men, renewing depraved souls in true holiness after
the image of God, sustaining the life of the Church through a quick-
ening influence in the mind and heart of believers individually —
these are Avorks w^hich God only can perform. In this agency the
Spirit must be operative through the whole Church, in the mind of
every believer. Indeed, the sphere of his agency is vastly broader;
for he is a light and influence in every mind of the race. His per-
sonal agency must therefore be every- where operative. This is
' Joel ii, 28; Luke xxiv, 49; Acts i, 4, 5. ^ Luke xxiv, 49-
3 Acts iv, 31 ; 1 Thess. i, 5. ■'John xvi, 8-11. 'John iii, 5, 6.
"Bom. viii, 16. "Gal. v, 22, 23; Eph. v, 9.
*'2 Cor. iii, 18. «Eom. viii, 26, 27. '"Eph. iii, l(i.
"Eph. ii, 18. ''^ 2 Cor. xii, 13.
DIVINITY OF THE SPIRIT. 2G5
conclusive of his omniscience and omnipotence; for it is only through
such attributes that a personal agency can be omnipresent. Hence,
in every view of the work of the Spirit in the economies of religion,
and especially in Christianity, he is truly and essentially divine.
3. Supreme Worshij) fulness. — The worship of the Holy Spirit is
not so fully revealed as that of the Son. It is neither so explicitly
enjoined as a duty nor so frequently exemplified in instances of
worship. Yet there are facts of Scripture which clearly ^acts in
give the sense of his supreme worshipfulness. Such is proof.
the fact that he may be the subject of the deej)est blasphemy.'
Blasphemy is the use of reproachful or impious terms respecting
God or against God. Its specially deep impiety arises from the in-
finite perfections of God and his supreme claim upon our devout
homage. When, therefore, we find in the Scriptures a blasphemy
against the Holy Ghost of the very deepest turpitude and demerit
the fact must mean his supreme claim upon the reverence and wor-
ship of men. The sanctity and responsibility of an oath arise from
the perfections of God, in whose name alone it must be taken, and
ever with reverence." Otherwise an oath is profane and impious.
Yet there is an asseveration of Paul in the presence of the Holy
Spirit which is of the very essence of an oath : " I say the truth in
Christ, I lie not, my conscience also bearing me witness in the Holy
Ghost.'' ' " This being an appeal to Christ and to the Holy Ghost,
as knowing the apostle's heart, is of the nature of an oath.'"
" This is one of the most solemn oaths any man can take. He ap-
peals to Christ as the Searcher of hearts that he tells the truth;
asserts that his conscience was free from guile in the matter, and
that the Holy Ghost bore him testimony that what he said was
true." ^ *' The best commentators are agreed that this is a form of
solemn protestation partaking of the nature of an oath. . . . The
full sense of the words is : ^ I protest by Christ that I speak the
truth. I take the Holy Spirit, who knoweth my heart, to witness
that I lie not.'"" Thus did Paul asseverate in the name and pres-
ence of the Holy Spirit, with all that constitutes the substance and
solemnity of an oath, just as elsewhere he more formally made oath
in the name of God.' Such an oath is utterly irreconcilable with
the religious faith and life of Paul, except with devout reverence for
the Holy Spirit, such as is central to the supreme worship of God.
The Holy Spirit occupies the same position in the form of bap-
' Matt, xii, 31. 'Deiit. vi, 13 ; Matt, v, 83-36.
^Roin. ix, 1. ■* Mackniglit : On the Epistles, in loc.
' Clarke : Commentary, in loc. ^ Bloomfield : Greek Testament, in loc.
' 2 Cor. i, 23.
206 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
tism as the Father and the Son.' I'his sacrament has a profound
religious significance, and its administration is a very
AND BKNEDic- rcal rcHgious service. In this service the faith of the
TioN. Church embraces the central truths of the Gospel, and
her prayers are poured forth for the great spiritual blessings which
the baptism signifies. Truly there is profound worship in this serv-
ice. In the light of Scripture, as in the deepest consciausness of the
Church, even from the beginning, these great blessings come more
immediately from the Holy Spirit. Did our Lord in the institution
of this sacrament mean that the Holy Spirit should be omitted from
the supreme worship in its proper administration? Surely not.
Else, he has very strangely enjoined the administration in the name
of the Holy Spirit, just as in the name of the Father and of the
Son. What is true of the form of baptism is equally true of the apos-
tolic benediction. This benediction is an invocation of blessings
from the Holy Spirit, just as from the Father and the Son.' It is
an invocation, with adoration of the Spirit, just as of the Father
and the Son. The divine attributes, divine works, and supreme
worshipfulness of the Holy Spirit are conclusive of his divinity.
4. Relative Subordination. — The Spirit is of one and the same
substance with the Father and the Son. Any divergence from this
doctrine must be either tritheistic, or Arian, or purely Unita-
rian. Yet the Church early accepted, and still holds, the doctrine
of an economical or relative subordination of the Spirit to the
Father. This subordination appears in the offices which the Spirit
fulfills in the divine economies of religion, particularly in Chris-
tianity. After the adoption of the Filioque, the procession of the
Spirit from the Son also, there was for the Western Church the
same sense of subordination to the Son. There is a mission of the
Spirit from both the Father and the Son, and in this mission ap-
pears the subordination of the Spirit. The subordination, how-
ever, is purely on the ground of procession, not from any distinc-
tion in true and essential divinity.
' Matt, xxviii, 19. ^2 Cor. xiii, 14.
General reference. — Owen : Discourses on the Holy Spirit ; Pearson : Exposi-
tion of the Creed, article viii ; Smeaton : On the Holy Spint ; Morgan : Scripture
Testimony to the Holy Spirit ; Walker : Doctrine of the Holy Spirit ; Hare : The
Mission of the Comforter ; Parker : The Paraclete, Essays on the Personality
and Ministry of the Holy Spirit ; Heber : PersoJiality and Office of the Co^n-
fortcr, Bampton Lectures, 1816 ; Buchanan : Office and Work of the Holy
Spirit ; Daunt : Person and Offices of the Holy Spirit, Donnell Lectures, 1879 ;
Cardinal Manning : Internal Work of the Holy Ghost ; Stowell : The Work of
the Spirit, Congregational Lectures, 1849 , Moberly : Administration of the Holy
Spirit in the Body of Christ, Bamptou Lectures, 1868.
PROOFS OF THE TRINITY. 267
CHAPTER VIII.
TRUTH OF THE TRINITY.
The doctrine of the Trinity, as formulated in Christian theology,
is exclusively a question of revelation. Hence the ground of
question of its truth has respect simply to the reality the doctrine.
and sufficiency of its Scripture ground. The Scriptures neither
formulate the doctrine nor directly express it. The one text most
nearly approaching such an expression is no longer accredited as
genuine, and therefore is dismissed from the discussion.' The
Scriptures clearly give the elements of the doctrine. These ele-
ments in proper combination truly constitute the doctrine. There-
fore the doctrine itself is a truth of the Scriptures. This is the
method of proof. It will thus readily appear that but little remains
for our discussion. We have sufficiently treated the primary ques-
tions of the Trinity, and it only remains so to bring the results to-
gether as to render clear and conclusive the Scripture proofs of the
doctrine.
I. Proofs of the Trinity.
1. Omissiofi of Questionable Proofs. — The argument for the
Trinity from the Scriptures is so full and clear thatthei'e is no need
of questionable proofs. Yet some long in use may be so classed.
We may instance the plural form of the divine name ; the threefold
priestly benediction ; the tersanctus or trinal ascription of holiness
to God ; the manifestation of Father, Son, and Spirit at the bap-
tism of Christ. These facts were pressed into the argument for
the Trinity by leading fathers of the Church, and have continued
to be so used by very eminent divines. Yet others, not inferior
either in the exegesis of the Scriptures or in reaching their doc-
trinal content, fail to find any direct proof of this doctrine in these
facts. With this opposition of views between the friends of the
doctrine the facts in question can hardly be of any use in a polemic
with its opponents.
The plural divine name, D^n^.^' — Elohim — occurs in many places.
Only an overstrained definition, however, could give it plural di-
the sense of a trinal distinction of persons in the God- ^'^^^ namk.
head. Elohim is placed in apposition with niiT; ^ — Jehovah — and in
■ 1 John V, 7. ' Deut. iv, 35 ; 1 Kings xviii, 31.
268 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
such instances a plural sense of the former would be inconsistent
with the latter. Therefore Elohim has no fixed plural sense which
p K I E t! T I. Y can give the personal distinctions of the Trinity. There
BENKoicTioN. jg ^ thrccfold priestly benediction in the one divine
name, Jehovah.' With those who use the fact for the proof of the
Trinity, stress is laid upon the definite trinal form of benediction
and the distinction of blessings, as at once indicating and distin-
guishing the three persons of the Trinity, It is only as the text is
read in the light of later and fuller revelations that any such mean-
ing appears. Hence this form of priestly benediction is not in itself
THE TER- any proof of the Trinity. There is in the Scriptures a
sANcrrs. thrice-holy predicate of God.^ But, as in the previous
case, it is only as we read this Trisagion in the light of a fuller rev-
elation of the Trinity that we find in it any suggestion of the doc-
trine. It is therefore in itself without proof of the doctrine. Fa-
thers of the Church were wont to say : *' Go to the Jordan and you
shall see the Trinity." They had in view the manifestation of the
Father, the Son, and the Spirit at the baptism of Christ.'
THE BAPTISM. . .
In the clear light of the New Testament, and with the
doctrine constructed out of the truths which it reveals, we do recog-
nize the three persons of the Trinity in this divine manifestation.
But apart from this fuller revelation very little truth of the Trinity
is given ; for these manifestations, simply in themselves, might stand
with the Arian or Semi-Arian heresy.
2. Verity of the ConstUiient Facts. — The unity of God, the per-
sonal distinctions of Father, Son, and Spirit, the divinity of the
Son, and the personality and divinity of the Spirit we have found
to be clear and sure truths of Scripture. The result is not trithe-
ism, but a triunity of persons in the Godhead — the doctrine of the
Trinity.
3. Tlie Facts Determinative of the Doctrine. — The argument for
the Trinity centers in the requirement of the doctrine for the in-
terpretation and harmony of the Scripture facts. It is
SCIENTIFIC ^ -^ ^ . . ,
METHOD oFTiiE in tlic mcthod of science, which accepts as a principle
ARorMENT. ^j. ^^^^ whatever will interpret and unite the relative
facts; and the more when such principle or law is the only means
of explaining and uniting them. Such a result is the inductive
verification of the principle or law. The Trinity is the only doc-
trine which can interpret and harmonize the trinal distinction
of divine persons in the unity of God. It is therefore the doc-
trine of Scripture. We proceed in precisely the same method in
Christology, so far as it respects the person of Christ. While the
' Num. vi, 24-36. '' Isa. vi, 3 ; Rev. iv, 8. ' Matt, iii, 16, 17.
PROOFS OF THE TRINITY. 269
Scriptures reveal him as one person, they freely ascribe to him both
human and divine facts. The facts are interpreted and harmony
attained through a union of the human and divine natures in the
unity of his personality. This doctrine of his personality is thus
inductively verified as a truth of Scripture. In the same method
we have maintained the doctrine of the Trinity. The method is
legitimate and the proof conclusive. The doctrine is a truth of
the Scriptures.
II. Mystery of the Trinity.
1. Aiove otir Reason. — The Scriptures give the facts of the
Trinity, but without any doctrinal combination, and without any
explanation of their seeming contrariety. There is no solution of
the mystery for our reason. Whoever attempts an explication of
the doctrine must treat it either superficially or in a fruitless specu-
lation. The highest attainment is in a scriptural and accordant
statement of the constituent facts, with the doctrinal result.
2. Witlwut Analogies. — The mystery of the doctrine naturally
incites an outlooking for illustrations which may bring it into the
apprehension of thought. In the literature of the question we
find the results of such incitement. Attempts at illus- search for
tration began with the early Christian fathers and have analogies.
continued to the present time. Joseph Cook, following the exam-
ple of so long a line of predecessors, gives an illustration in his own
impressive mode of thought and expression.' Christlieb, also re-
cent in the treatment of the doctrine, is elaborate in the use of
analogies." Our criticism of such illustrations, whether of ancient
or modern use, is that they are without sufficient basis in analogy,
and therefore useless for both reason and faith. The notice of a
few instances may suffice for the force of this criticism.
The triple facts of intellect, sensibility, and will unite in the
personality of mind. True; but no ground remains attempted il-
for any personal distinctions either in the mind or in li'stratioxs.
the powers which constitute its personality. No possible distinc-
tion between personal mind and its constitutive powers or between
these powers can have any analogy to the personal distinctions of
the Trinity. Thesis, antithesis, and synthesis are so related in
thought as to constitute a trinity in unity. Perhaps not. For
such a result the three must completely co-exist in thought, and
the possibility of such a co-existence is far from sure. Further,
analysis holds as closely with these forms of thought as they do
' Boston Monday Lectures, " Orthodoxy," pp. 62, 68.
^ Modern Doubt and Christian Belief, pp. 275-278.
2-70 SYSTEMATICA TIIEOI/XiY.
with each other. With this fact, the four might combine in as
complete a unity of 'thought as the three. All analogy of the
three with the Trinity is thus shown to be fallacious. Besides,
modes of thought can have no analogy to the personal subsistences
of the Trinity. There is a trinity of dimensions in the unity
of space, and a trinal distinction of past, present, and future in
the unity of time. These dimensions and distinctions, however,
are purely relative, and without any reality in the absolute i;nities
of space and time. Even if realities, they still could have no like-
ness to the Trinity. We think in propositions, and cannot else
think at all. A proposition is a trinity of subject, predicate, and
copula. All this is true; but the distinction of parts in a proposi-
tion has no analogy to the distinction of persons in the Trinity,
and for the obvious reason that in the former case there are no
personal qualities as in the latter. Man in personality is a trinity
of body, soul, and spirit. This trichotomic anthropology is not
settled as a truth. If it were, the instance would still be useless.
Body and soul, as apart from mind, have no personal quality.
Hence the distinction of natures in the unity of man can have no
analogy to the distinction of persons in the unity of God. Lumi-
nosity, color, and heat combine in the unity of light. But light is
no such a unity as personality. Nor have its properties any personal
quality. There is no analogy to the Trinity. Such illustrations
are really useless for both reason and faith, and we think it better
to omit them.
There is a widely prevalent trinitarianism in pagan philosophy and
religions, but it is valueless for the Christian doctrine,
TRINtTYIN *=' '
PAGAN PHI- except as an indication that trinitarianism is rather at-
LosopHY. tractive than repulsive to speculative thought. It is
valueless because so very different in its contents. The doctrine of
the Platonic philosophy, and of Brahmanism and Zoroastrianism,
so far as representing a trinal distinction of divine persons, is rather
tritheistic than trinitarian. There is in neither a union of the
divine persons in the unity of God. The doctrine of emanation, so
prevalent in these systems, carries with it the sense of inferiority
or a lower grade in the emanations. Hence, so far as in these sys-
tems we find a trinal distinction of divine persons, they are neither
truly and essentially divine, nor yet a trinity in any proper sense
of the Christian doctrine.' This doctrine, without any antecedent
in philosophy, or in the speculations of pagan religions, has its sure
and only ground in the Scriptures.
' Knapp : Christian Theoloyy, p. 145 ; Shedd : History of Christian Doctrine,
vol. i, pp. 343-245.
MYSTERY OF THE TRINITY. 271
3. A Credible Truth. — The objection most commonly urged
against the doctrine of the Trinity is its mystery; whereas this is
in itself no valid objection. If all mysteries were in-
■' "^ , . MYSTERY NO
credible, the sphere of truth would be infinitely nar- talid ob-
rowed. The world within us and without us is replete •"'-ction.
with mystery. The facts of nature which are combined in the
many forms of science are open to observation, but the laws of nat-
ure, without which there is no true science, are realities only for
rational thouglit, and in themselves a profound mystery. What
do we know of cohesive attraction? or of the forces of chemical
affinity? or of gravitation, acting, across the measureless spaces
that separate the stars, and binding all systems in the harmony of
the heavens? or of life in the manifold forms of its working? or of
the power of the will, which in all voluntary agency reveals itself
in our own consciousness? We know forces in their phenomena,
and in the laws of their action, but forces themselves are for us an
utter mystery. If we must dismiss all mysteries, the higher truths
of science and philosophy must go with the higher truths of re-
ligion as no longer truths for us. But mystery is no limit of credi-
bility. The principle is as valid for the doctrine of the Trinity as
for science and philosophy. Were the constituent facts
J. , T . . T ... CONSISTENCY
01 the doctrine m contradictory opposition, it would be ok constitc-
incredible, but for that reason, and not because of its ^^'^ facts.
mystery. Unitarianism may assert their contradictory opposition,
and even make a plausible case, but only on such a modified state-
ment of the facts as violates polemical justice. The facts as posited
by Trinitarians are not contradictory. Hence, the doctrine, how-
ever profound a mystery, is properly accepted as a truth of the
Scriptures. It has the credibility of the Scriptures themselves.
4. A Vital Truth of Christianity. — The doctrine of the Trinity
is no speculative abstraction, but a central truth of the Gospel, and
closely articulated with all that is evangelical in Christian theology.
Without it the religion of Christ falls away into a mere moral system.
The divine Fatherhood is largely the theology of professedly
Christian Unitarianism, however rationalistic it may
^ . . -^ TRUTH OP THE
be. Its frequent utterance is m a tone of fondness and ditine fa-
assurance. Reference to exjDressions of Christ cannot ™erhood.
be omitted, even though all that is supernatural be denied him.
No other ever put such meaning into the words, " The Father,"
"Your Father," ''My Father," ''Our Father." Unitarianism
may pervert their meaning, but cannot overstate their plenitude of
truth and grace. As we previously pointed out, the divine Father-
hood is given only through the divine Sonship. Our own existence
272 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
is through tlie creative work of God; tiiul we are liis offspring only
in a figurative sense. No liigher sense of his Fatherhood is given
simply through our creation. The divine Fatherhood, with its
plenitude of grace and love, is given only through the divine filia-
tion of the Son. It cannot be given in any form of professedly
Christian Unitarianism or Itationalism. It was not given in the
older Socinianism, though it held so strongly the miraculous con-
ception of Christ; for in any rational sense of this fact the divine
agency was operative simply in a creative mode. Arianism has no
other mode of the Son's existence. Semi-Arianism, ho?noiou,sian
as to the nature of the Son, is too indefinite respecting both his
nature and mode of existence to give any true sense of the divine
Fatherhood in correlation with the divine Sonship. These deepest
truths are given only with the doctrine of the Trinity. The divine
Fatlierhood is at once real and revealed through the divine filiation of
the Son. Christianity could not part Avith this trutli without infinite
loss. Our religious consciousness needs it, and the more with the
truer sense of sin and the deeper exigencies of our moral and spiritual
life. In the intensest expressions of God's love emphasis is placed
on the Sonship of Christ, through whose mediation he achieved our
redemption.' The divine Fatherhood as revealed in the divine Son-
ship is the only sufficient pledge of his grace and love. Hence for
this pledge we are carried into the central truths of the Trinity.
The atonement is bound up with the doctrine of the Trinity, as
TRINITY AND ^^ ^^ grouudlcss without the true and essential divinity
ATONKMENT. of thc Sou. It Is uot mcaut that Arianism formally
rejected the atonement, but that, with such a Christology, it was
illogically retained. It is true that Arianism represents the Son as
very great — so great as to be the Creator of all things. If, however,
as this doctrine holds, the Son was himself a created being, he could
not create the heavens and the earth, nor any part of them ; and
this representation of his greatness must be an extreme exaggera-
tion. A created being cannot create other existences. His powers,
however great, must still be finite, and therefore infinitely short of
creative energy. Neither could a created being, and therefore
finite and dependent, redeem a sinful race. Only the divine Son
could make an atonement for sin. It is noteworthy that the
sacred writers present the infinite greatness of Christ in connec-
tion with his redeeming work, as though the former were a nec-
essary assurance of his sufficiency for the latter. It was the
Word, who was God, and maker of all things, who was incar-
nated in our nature for the purpose of our redemption." The
' John iii, 16 ; Rom. viii, 32 ; 1 Johu iv, 10. ' John i. 1-3. 14.
MYSTERY OF THE TRINITY. 27:!
Son, through whose blood we have redemption and remission of sins,,
created all things in heaven and earth, visible and invisible, thrones,
dominions, principalities, povrers — all things.' There is significance
in such association of these truths. The divinity of the Son is to be
understood as the necessary ground of his atonement and the assur-
ance of its sufficiency. Without his divinity there is no atonement
for sin. But his divinity is a central and determining truth of the
Trinity ; so that the atonement is indeed bound up with this doc-
trine. It is therefore a vital doctrine in Christianity.
The offices of the Holy Spirit in the economies of religion, and
particularly in Christianity, as previously. pointed out, ^^^^^^.^ ^^^
are manifold and profound. It must follow that the thk holy
character of Christianity as a religion is largely involved ''''"^''^•
in the question of his personality and divinity. Without these
truths the agency of the Spirit cannot stand in the same light as
with them. Neither can the fruits of his agency stand in the same
light. Conviction for sin, regeneration, assurance of a gracious
sonship through the witness of the Spirit, the help of the Spirit in
the duties of life and his consolations in its sorrows, the graces of
the Christian life as the fruits of the Spirit — these cannot have the
same meaning without their source in the personal agency of the
divine Spirit. There is a falling away of Christianity into a mere
moral system. Christ is a wise teacher and a good example, but
not a divine Saviour. The personal agency of the Spirit in the
Christian life lapses into the motives of the Gospel and the moral
culture of one's self. So vital is the doctrine of the Holy Spirit,
and with it the doctrine of the Trinity in Christianity.
The sacrament of baptism, so significant of our moral and spir-
itual need, and so assuring of all needed help from the baptism and
Father, and the Son, and the Spirit, in whose name we BKXKDicTaoN.
are baptized, would be quite meaningless without the truths which
we combine in the doctrine of the Trinity. The apostolic bene-
diction, which invokes for Christians the love of God, and the
grace of Christ, and the communion of the Holy Spirit, would be
equally meaningless. The formula of baptism and the invocation
of the benediction are not meaningless, but profoundly significant
of the deepest truths of Christianity. With these truths the doc-
trine of the Trinity is given.
The vital offices of the Son and the Spirit in the econ- ^^^^^ offices
omy of redemption and in the salvation which the Gos- of son and
pel reveals may be further emphasized by a brief but
significant text : " For through him we both have access by one
' Col. i, 14-16.
19
274 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
Spirit unto the Father." ' This one great privilege is for both Jews
and Gentiles. The privilege is great because there is salvation for us
only in this access to the Father. It is attainable only through the
redemptive mediation of the Son for us, and the gracious work of
the Spirit within us. Each office requires a personal divine agency,
and both the Son and the Spirit must be divine persons. These
truths are simply central to the all-pervasive sfense of Scripture re-
specting the offices of the Son and the Spirit in our salvation. In
their combination we have the doctrine of the Trinity. It follows
that the rejection of this doctrine is the rejection of these vital truths.
The doctrine of the Trinity deeply concerns the Christian life.
Bishop Butler clearly points out the obligations of duty
and^"t"'ik arising from the relations in which the Son and the
CHRISTIAN Holy Spirit stand to us in the economy of redemption
and salvation. These duties arise from moral grounds,
just as the duties which arise with the relations in which we stand
to each other and to God. As related to others, we are under the
obligations of justice, truth, kindness, charity ; as related to God,
we are under the obligations of reverence, obedience, and love : so,
as related to the Son and Spirit, we are under obligations of " rev-
erence, honor, love, trust, gratitude, fear, hope. In what external
manner this worship is to be expressed is a matter of pure revealed
command ; as perhaps the external manner in Avhich God the
Father is to be worshiped may be more so than we are ready to
think. But the worship, the internal worship itself, to the Son and
Holy Ghost, is no further matter of pure revealed command than
as the relations they stand in to us are matter of pure revelation ;
for the relations being known, the obligations to such internal wor-
ship are obligations of reason, arising out of those relations them-
selves. In short, the history of the Gospel as immediately shows
us the reason of these obligations as it shows ns the meaning of
the words Son and Holy Spirit.""
As the duties of the Christian life are thus concerned with the
doctrine of the Trinity, so, with this doctrine, there are
ALL DEEPER . "^ . .
TRUTH WITH the weightier truths for our faith and experience, and
THE TRINITY, j^f^ggfj fQj. ^he wholc practical life of religion. "Whether
in comparison with j)uro Unitarianism or even the highest form of
Ariauism, there is an infinite fullness and depth of truth in the
true and essential divinity of the Son and the Spirit, with the
incarnation and atonement of the one, and the vital agency of
the other in our spiritual life. These distinctive truths of the
Trinity embody the weightiest motives of the Gospel, and thus give
' Eph. ii, 18. " Analogy, part ii, chap, i, sec. 2.
MYSTERY OF THE TRINITY. 2/5
to the faith which truly embraces them the greatest practical effi-
ciency, while at the same time they deepen and intensify the expe-
riences and practical forces of the inner Christian life. Hence it
is that in the history of the Church we find with the doctrine of
the Trinity the most spiritual, practical, and evangelistic type of
Christianity. Trinitarians may fall short, and far short, of their
faith in both the inner and outer life. Still for them there are the
highest possibilities of both. There are not such j)ossibilities with
any anti-trinitarian creed. As the religious faith departs from the
doctrine of the Trinity it must in a like measure lose the significance
of the mediation of Christ and the agency of the Holy Spirit in the
religious life. By so much does Christianity fall away from its
true evangelical form toward a mere moral system. In pure Uni-
tarianism this fall is quite complete. From this ground no evan-
gelical development of Christianity is possible. It is an open truth
that the deepest and most earnest Christian life of the present,
whether as an inner experience and practical force, or as an out-
ward endeavor toward the evangelization of the world, is with the
Trinitarian Churches.
We have attempted no philosophy of the Trinity. There is
for us no present solution of the doctrine. There is,
, 1 -1 1 J? -J. £ T • -n A PHILOSOPHY
however, a philosophy of its protound significance p ^ ^ the
for the spiritual and practical Christian life. This christian
philosophy we have clearly indicated. God in Chris-
tianity is God in Trinity. This doctrine underlies the most vital
forces of the Gospel, and on the ground of Scripture we hold it
in a sure faith, whatever its mystery for our thought. " That
which remains a cross for our thinking is thus at the same time
the crown of the Christian conception of God." '
^ Van Oosterzee : Christian Dogmatics, vol. i, p. 293.
General reference. — Hooker : Ecclesiastical Polity, book v, sees. 51-56 ; Usher :
Body of Divinity, chap, iv ; Cudworth : Intellectual System, chap, iv ; Water-
land : Importance of the Doctrine of the Holy Trinity, Works, vol. iii ; Burton :
Antenicene Testimonies to the Doctrine of the Trinity ; Howe : The Oracles
of God, lects. xiii-xvi ; Bull : Defense of the Nicene Creed ; Owen : God the
Father, Son, and Holy Ghost ; Vindication of the Doctrine of the Trinity, Works
(Goold's), vol. li ; Edwards : Observations on the Trinity ; Bickersteth : The
Bock of Ages ; Cook : Boston Monday Lectures, " Orthodoxy ; " Taylor : Revealed
Theology, The Trinity ; Graves : Select Proofs of the Trinity, Works, vol. iii ;
Christlieb : Modern Doubt and Christian Belief, lect. iv ; Kidd : On the Trinity ;
Treffrey : The Trinity ; Dorner : Doctrine of the Person of Christ, Nicene
Trinity, vol. ii, pp. 181-346.
Unitarian view. — Clark: Orthodoxy , eha^). xvi; Norton: Statement of Reasons ;
Wilson: Unitarian Principles ; Eliot: Unity of God; Forrest: On the Trinity.
27G SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
CHAPTER IX.
GOD IN CREATION.
In opening this question certain points should be noted, certain
pRKUMiNARY distiuctions made, as preliminary to the main discus-
DisTiNCTioxs. gjon. This is necessary to clearness, for the reason that
the question concerns several spheres of creative work. The dis-
tinctions between matter simply as being, matter in its orderly
physical forms, and matter in its organic forms, give rise to different
questions respecting the work of creation. Then there is the dis-
tinction between material and spiritual existences. This distinction
is so profound that the creation of matter and the creation of mind
are two separate questions. We have thus indicated the points
which must be more formally discriminated in their discussion.
I. The Question of Creation.
1. Several Spheres of Creative Work. — There can be no actual
MATTFR AND scparatiou between matter as substance and its primary
ITS ORDERLY qualitics, though there is a real distinction for abstract
thought. But tliere is no such inseparable connection
between matter and its orderly forms. The latter we may think
entirely away from the former. They are actually separable. The
fact is manifest in many instances. Cohesive attraction loosens its
grip and solid bodies disintegrate and dissolve. Chemical com-
pounds are resolved into their discrete elements. Organic forms
decay and fall again into dust. The earth was once a chaos, form-
less and void. This is a truth of Scripture,' and a truth of science
as well. It was the same in substance then, as now with its pleni-
tude of orderly forms. But while the substance may exist without
these forms it must ever be present in them. Idealism may specu-
latively question or even deny the reality of substantial being in the
cosmos, but must ever practically confess it. Positivism may ignore
this reality, but, with its confessed agnosticism, retains no right to
dispute it. But as matter and its orderly forms stand apart in the
manner stated, they constitute distinct spheres respecting the ques-
tion of creation.
The reality of being is given us through its properties as appre-
' Gen. i, 2.
THE QUESTION OF CREATION. 277
hended in sense-perception, or through its activities as apprehended
in consciousness. That which is extended in space and
^ . MATERIAL AND
divisible into parts, which has form and color, is more spiritual b&-
than its properties, is indeed substantial being as the ^^^"
necessary ground of such properties. That which thinks and feels,
which reasons and constructs the sciences and philosophies, which
is creative in aesthetic spheres, which is personally active in a moral
and religious life, is more than its faculties, more than its manifold
forms of thought and feeling, of rational and moral agency, is in-
deed the reality of being as the necessary ground of these multiform
powers and activities. There is equally the reality of being under
both the properties of body and the activities of mind. But as these
properties and activities unerringly point to the reality of being, so
they equally point to an essential distinction of being. The two
classes of properties and activities, the one of body and the other
of mind, have nothing in common. The cognition of them is in
totally different modes. With these profound distinctions, there
must be an essential difference between material and spiritual being.
Hence the eternity of the former could be no proof of the eternal
existence of the latter. Even if both have their original in the cre-
ative work of God, it must be through distinct energizings of his
will. It thus more fully appears that the distinction between ma-
terial and spiritual being deeply concerns the question of the creative
work of God.
2. Question of Creation Threefold. — All that is here required is
to bring together the distinctions previously made, and to point out
the result respecting the work of creation. The question whether
matter is eternal or a creation is distinct and complete in itself.
The question respecting the creation of the orderly forms of matter,
as they stand in the cosmos, is equally distinct and complete in it-
self. Further, if the eternity of matter were conclusively proved,
neither the eternity of the cosmos nor its naturalistic origination
could follow as a consequence. Finally, the essential distinction of
mind from matter, and of its faculties and activities from the prop-
erties and orderly forms of matter, separates the question of its
creation from that of both the others. Neither the eternity of mat-
ter nor the naturalistic evolution of the world in all its lower orderly
forms could give any account of the existence of personal mind.
Thus the question of the creative work of God has respect to three
distinct spheres. We might still make a further distinction in-
clusive of all living forms of existence below man, which would raise
the three to four.
These distinctions are so real and obvious, and the separation of
278 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
the question respecting matter itself from the other spheres of cre-
ation so complete, that a sweepino^ contrary may well
IllSTINCTIONS ' ' . J J
REAL AND bo thought strange. Yet there is such a contrary.
CLEAR. i, j£ ^YiQ first cause is limited, and there consequently
lies somethiug outside of it, this something must have no first
cause — must be uncaused. But if we admit that there can be some-
thing uncaused, there is no reason to assume a cause for any thing." '
Dr. Cocker takes the same position. Indeed, he indorses the view
of Spencer, or, rather, he indorses his own with that of Spencer.
" With what reason can we admit that some things do exist that
never were created, but others cannot so exist? If substances are
eternal, why not attributes? If matter is self-existent, why not
force? If space is independent, why not form? And if we concede
the eternity of matter and force, why not admit the eternity of law
— that is, uniformity of relations? And if so much is granted, why
not also grant that a consequent order of the universe is also eter-
nal? " ' In speaking of " things " supposed to exist without having
been created, there is reference to space, and time, and number, as
well as to matter ; and the position is that an admission of the
eternity of any one " tends to the invalidation of every proof of the
existence of God." Neither space, nor time, nor number is a cre-
atable entity in any proper sense of the term. Nor
THEISM NONE . '' . .
THE LESS could their eternity in any sense or measure invalidate
SURE. ^i^g proofs of theism. The existence of space and the
existence of orderly forms in space are entirely separate questions.
Law has no ontological existence, but is simply an expression of the
order of things. Hence to speak of an eternal law is to assume an
eternal order of existences. Whether the universe as an orderly
existence is eternal or of time-origin is a question of fact, and one
the decision of which is in no sense contingent upon the creation of
matter. The time-origin of the universe is a truth of science as
well as of Scripture. There is no surer truth of science. As an
origination in time, it is dependent, and must have a sufficient
cause. God only is such a cause. Therefore God is. The eternity
of matter could not invalidate this proof.
II. COXCERXING THE CREATION' OF MATTER.
For the present discussion this question is still on hand. We
have not, certainly not intentionally, intimated any doubt that
matter is a creation in the sense of a divine origination. So far,
we have simply aimed to discriminate the spheres of God's creative
' Spencer : First Frinciples, p. 37.
' Tkeistic Conception of the World, pp. 67, 68.
CONCERNING THE CREATION OF JMATTER. 279
work, aud for two ends: that we might attain a clearer view of his
work: and that the proofs of theism, while not here to
' -l- _ .... AIM OK PREVI-
be repeated, might remain secure on their distinctive ots distinc-
grounds, and especially that they might not illogically ^'°'^^'
be made contingent upon the most difficult question respecting the
creation of matter. That we hold this creation as a fact does not
commit us to all the proofs alleged.
1. The Question on A Priori Ground. — The position is often
taken that the eternity of matter is contradictory to the absolute-
ness of God. Hence its origination in his creative agency is an
immediate datum of his absoluteness. " The doctrine of creation
flows from the infinite perfection of God. There can ^ priori ar-
be but one infinite being. If any thing exists inde- gdmknts.
pendent of his will, God is thereby limited."' " However perplex-
ing the thought of a properly so-called creation from nothing may
be, yet it flows with absolute necessity from belief in an absolutely
almighty Creator. Nay, matter without any form cannot be con-
ceived of ; an eternal matter must also be an independent matter,
another God; of which it would be hard to explain why it ought or
should need to yield to the will of an almighty Fashioner.''^ "If
we admit that any thing besides God is self -existent, that any thing
exists independent of God as ' the condition of the divine agency
and manifestation,' then God is not the unconditioned absolute Be-
ing." ^ These citations are given as instances of this position, and
as examples of its expression. There is a false sense of the Infinite
and the Absolute, such as we previously considered, which would
have the consequences here alleged. That sense, however, neither
of these authors admits. With the true sense, which they fully
hold, the logic of their position is overstrained.
Common as the notion is in philosophic thought, it is not an
a priori truth that " there can be but one infinite be- (.^iT,ic,gj( ^p
ing." With the false sense of a quantitative, space-filling thk argu-
infinite, there could be but one. God is not infinite in *"''''''^^-
such a sense, but infinite in the plenitude of his personal perfec-
tions ; nor would he be less infinite, though another existed.
Moreover, if matter is eternal, it is not therefore an infinite being.
The eternal existence of matter as finite is just as conceivable as
the eternal existence of God as infinite. If matter is eternal, it is
independent of the creative and preserving agency of God ; but he
is not thereby limited. His perfections and sovereignty would be
' Hodge: Systematic Theology, vol. i, p. 561.
* Van Oosterzee : Christian Dogmatics, vol. i, p. 302.
^ Cocker : Theistic Conception of the World, p. 68,
280 SYSTEMA'IIC THEOLOGY.
just tlie same as with the origination of matter in his creative
agency. It is true that " matter without any form cannot be con-
ceived of," but it can be conceived without any orderly or cosmical
form. Whether created or eternal, tiiis is the primordial state of
matter in the view of both Scripture and science. Hence the eter-
nity of matter neither concludes the eternity of the cosmos nor the
power of its naturalistic evolution. When it is said that "an eter-
nal matter must also be an independent matter, another
KTKRNAI, MAT- , . •■ _ '
TKK OM.V God," logic is strained even to breaking. It would be
MAiThR. independent of God's creative agency, but might else be
as completely subject to his will as though his own creation. If
he could have created matter as it is, so could he annihilate it
and replace it with another, and none the less so on the supposi-
tion of its eternity. Hence, even on this supposition, there is no
independence of matter in contradiction to the true infinity and
absoluteness of God. The utmost extreme is reached in the as-
sumption that, if matter is eternal, " it must be another God."
Why another God because eternal ? Plainly, it is not God in any
sense, whether created or eternal. Duration itself has no deter-
mining influence upon the quality of any being. If we assume
that matter, if eternal, must be another God, we assume that the
eternity of its existence determines its quality as divine. Such an
assumption, however, is excluded as utterly groundless. As that
which is eternal has no cause of existence, neither has it any deter-
mining cause of its quality. It simply is what it is. There is no
a priori necessity that an eternal being must be a divine being. God
is God in what lie is, and from no determinate consequence of his
eternity. If matter were eternal, it would simply be what it is,
without any determining cause. The explanation of " why it
ought or should need to yield to the will of an almighty Fashioner "
is sufficiently given in his almightiness. Nor could the admission
"that any thing besides God is self-existent" involve
GOD NONK THK -^ »
LESS TiiK AH- thc conscqucnces that he " is not the Absolute Being,"
SOLUTE. unless such thing should be of a nature to limit or
condition him. As we have previously explained, matter itself
could exert no such power. In the further assumption that if
"any thing exists independent of God as * the condition of the
divine agency and manifestation,' then God is not the unconditioned
Absolute Being," there may be truth ; indeed, we might say there
must be truth, as the members of the proposition are identical. It
is a truth, however, which has no weight against the eternity of
space, and time, and number, for in no sense can these condition the
divine agency. It is equally invalid against the eternity of matter.
CONCERNING THE CREATION OF MATTER. 281
We tliink it clear, as tlie result of the previous criticism, that
there is no a priori proof of tlie creation of matter. Certainly
that proof does not appear in the arguments which we have re-
viewed. AVo know not any of greater strength.
2. On Cosuiohgical Ground. — A necessary link in the cosmolog-
ical argument for theism is the dependence of the cosmos. The
proof of this dependence centers in the manifest fact of its time-
origin. This time-origin, however, has respect simply to the
orderly forms of the cosmos, and leaves open the question respect-
ing matter itself. To prove the creation of matter by
the logic of the cosmological argument, it would be ^hk depknd-
necessary to prove its dependence or time-origin. This "-^'^'e o*" ^^'^-
is the vital point of the question. It is mainly a ques-
tion of physical science. AYhile great progress has been made in
physics, and rapidly in recent years, it is not yet a completed science.
Its diverse schools are conclusive of its incompleteness. " Many sci-
entists of to-day are of the opinion expressed b}^ Grove,' that 'prob-
ably man will never know the ultimate structure of matter.'" ^ Oth-
ers may look for such knowledge, but no one claims its attainment.
If there are as yet no datii of the science conclusive of the time-ori-
gin of matter, neither are there any conclusive against it. It is hardly
in the nature of the science that there ever should be such, while
the former, if not yet sufficient, may be attainments of the future.
Some scientists claim the present attainment and possession of
facts sufficient to prove tlie time-origin and creation of pj^^^^, ^j,, j,^.
matter. " Chemical analysis most certainly points to pendknce
an origin, and effectually destroys the idea of an external '^'''^'•"^"^"•
self-existent matter, by giving to each of its atoms the essential
character, at once, of a manufactured article and a subordinate
agent." '^ "None of the processes of nature, since the time when
nature began, have produced the slightest difference in the proper-
ties of any molecule. We are therefore unable to ascribe either the
existence of the molecules or the identity of their properties to the
operation of any of the causes which we call natural. On the
other hand, the exact equality of each molecule to all others of the
same kind gives it the essential character of a manufactured article,
and precludes tlie idea of its being eternal and self -existent. " *
1 Correlation of Physical Forces, p. 187.
'■' Cocker : Theistic Conception of ths World, p. 132.
"* Sir John Herschel : Dissertations on the Study of Natural Philosophy,
sec. 28.
■* Professor Clerk Maxwell: Nature, vol. viii, p. 411; these citations in
Cocker ; Theistic Conception of the World, pp. 125, 126.
282 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
Respecting the more direct point, the only difference between
Herschel and Maxwell is that what the former alleges of the atoms
the latter alleges of the molecules.
3. 0)1 Teleological Ground. — The central and necessary fact in
the teleological argument for theism is the manifestation of rational
intelligence in the conception of ends and the adjustment of means
for their attainment. With the cosmos as an end, there is the
use of matter in its formation. There can be no question of a
ADAPTATIONS marvclous adaj^tation of matter to this end. Does this
OKMATTKR. adaptatlou lead us certainly to its creation for this end?
The answer little concerns the question of a divine teleology in the
cosmos. With a negative answer, such teleology would still have
sure ground and ample room. The mechanical use of a machine
may so determine the material for its construction as to allow but
little skill in its selection. The material of a locomotive is not only
well suited to its mechanical use, but a practical necessity. Hence
the sphere of skill in its selection is very narrow ; yet the rational
teleology in the conception of its use, and in its construction for
that use, is not thereby diminished. In like manner, even if mat-
ter were an eternal existence, the conception of the cosmos as an
end and the constructive use of mutter in its formation would still
be conclusive of a divine teleology.
Whether the ground of teleology can carry us any further depends
NOTHING IN wpon the scientific discovery of an inner constitution of
sciKNCE j>E- matter which evinces its origin in time, and its creation
cisivK. £^^. cosmical uses. Some claim such a discovery, as we
have recently seen, but without any decisive concurrence of scien-
tific authority. Such opinion, therefore, cannot be conclusive of the
creation of matter. Further, as previously noted, the facts which
mark the molecules or even the atoms as "manufactured articles"
may not be primordial with matter itself, but a product of the
divine agency in its preparation for cosmical uses. The molecules
are not the ultimatcs of matter, and therefore not necessarily origi-
nal with it. Even if matter itself is eternal, it is easily conceivable
that God in the process of his creative agency should cast it in its
molecular forms, or even endow its atoms with affinities and po-
tencies not originally theirs.
The conclusion is that the creation of matter is no a priori
truth, and that, while nothing appears in the light of science as
contradictory to its creation, neither does any thing yet appear as
conclusive of it.
4. In the Light of Scripture. — Here the question may be studied
either in the more specific terms of creation or in the informing
CONCERNING THE CREATION OF MATTER. 2R3
idea of passages which beyond a mere verbal sense express the
work of creation.
The more specific terms in the Hebrew are X73, nb'j?, "ivv The
second and third have rarely been given the definitive sense of im-
mediate or originative creation of matter. There is nothing in the
root-sense or biblical use of the words to warrant such a definition.
The same is true of the first. " The best critics under-
BIBLICAL
stand them as so nearly synonymous that, at least in terms of
regard to the idea of making out of nothing, little or no creation.
foundation for that doctrine can be obtained from the use of the
first of these words. They are used indiffej^ently and interchange-
ably in many passages ; as, for example, in Isa. xliii, 7, where they
all three occur applied to the same divine act. The Septuagint
renders Nn2 indifl^erently by noLeiv and k-'lc^elv. But especially in
the account of the creation in Gen. i, the verbs are used irrespect-
ively in verses 7, 16, 21, 25, etc. ; and in comparing Gen. i, 27, and
ii, 7, man is said to have been created, yet he is also said to have
been formed out of the ground. Again, in the decalogue (Exod.
XX, 11) the verb is nb'y, made, not created." ' "The Hebrew word
xn3, rendered create, has nothing abstract or metaphysical about it.
It is as clearly phenomenal as aiiy word in the language. Its pri-
mary meaning is to cut, hence to shave, shape, form, or fashion.'"*
The result is, not that the primitive act of creation was not origina-
tive of matter itself, but that there is no conclusive proof of such
origination on purely philological ground.
The result is the same in the mere verbal study of icni^eiv and
TToidv, the terms of creation in the New Testament,
and in common use in the Septuagint for the rendering
of the Hebrew words previously considered. K-i^ew, " literally,
to make habitable, to build, to plant a colony. . . . Then, in gen-
eral, to set up, to establish, to effect any thing. In the Septuagint
it answers mainly to the Hebrew N^3, though this word in Genesis
is always rendered by ttoieIv, and afterward by either noielv or
KTi^etv, and, indeed, more rarely by noielv, but not (as has been
&a.id) exclnsivelj by KTi^eiv."^ An originative creation of matter
does not appear in the mere verbal sense of these words. It could
not have been an original sense, because such a creation had no
place in the Greek mind which originated and used these terms.
It does not follow that the sense of an originative creation of
matter is not in the Scriptures. All exegesis is not purely philo-
' Kitto : Cyclopaedia of Biblical Literature, "Creation."
'^ Lewis : The Six Days of Creation, p. 48.
^ Cremer : Biblico-Theological Lexicon.
GREEK TERMS.
28* SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
logical. There are other laws of interpretation, and must be, for
the reason that philology alone cannot always give the
OF i.NTEKi-uK- fulI mcauing or even the true meaning of an author.
TATioN. ^j^^ g^^^i^ etymological restriction would deny to the
words of the Hebrew Scriptures the reception of any ncv/ or varied
mining in the advancement of revelation, and equally to Chris-
tianity the introduction of any new ideas into the Greek of the
New Testament. Nothing in either case could be more false to
the facts. While, therefore, an originative creation of matter
cannot be determined from the Scriptures on purely verbal grounds,
such a sense of creation may be clearly given through other laws of
interpretation.
It is an obvious principle of interpretation that often the con-
coNNFCTioNs '^cctions of a word, rather than its etymology, deter-
OF TKRMs OF miuc its meaning. By such a law we may find in the
CREATION. gj.g|. J3J|j]jg^| ^jgg Qf j^-|3 ^|jg sense of an originative crea-
tion of matter. This is really the method of interpretation and
the chief resource of such as claim for the word itself the sense of
such a creation. We may notice a few instances; not so much for
exemplification, however, as for the proof thus given of the crea-
tion of matter. On Gen. i, 1, as containing this sense of creation:
" This is also shown in the connection between our verse and the
one which follows: 'And the earth was zvithout form, and void;'
not before, but when, or after, God created it. From this it is evi-
dent that the void and formless state of the earth was not uncreated
or without a beginning. At the same time it is evident from the
creative acts which follow (vers. 3-18) that the heaven and earth,
as God created them in the beginning, were not the well-ordered
universe, but the world in its elementary form; just as Euripides
applies the expression ovpavog km yaia to the undivided mass [ji-oqcjir]
Ilia) which was afterward formed into heaven and earth." ' *' But
whatever weight may be due to the usage of the term,
oFTHKSKcoN- it Is to bc uotcd that the question turns not so much
NECTioNs. ^^ ^i^g sense of the verb, taken alone and apart from
the context, as on the way in which it is to be viewed in such a
peculiar collocation as, ' In the heginning God created tlie heavens
and the eartii.' Granted, that in itself the term does not abso-
lutely deny or affirm the presence of pre-exi^.ting matter, and that
this can be inferred only from the context or subject treated of, the
question comes to be. What can be the meaning of the term here?
The expression, ' In the beginning,' evidently refers to the begin-
ning of created existence, in contradistinction to the eternal being
' Keil and Delitzscli : On the Pentateuch, pp. 47, 48.
CONCERNING THE CREATION OF MATTER. 285
of the Creator, and is thus an absolute beginning in and with
time."' There is still anotlier or further decisive connection of
this verb. It lies in the conjunctive transition to the state of the
earth. " Verse 2 begins, 'And the earth,' etc.; but no history can
begin with the Hebrew vav, whether taken in the sense of hnt or
and." ' It follows that verse 2 is an historic continuation of ve^jse
1; and hence, that the meaning must be the creation of the earth
as a void and formless mass. With this result, the meaning must
be an originative creation of matter. The void and formless state
of the product precludes the sense of a cosmical formation and
leaves only the sense of origination.
The following words are treated by some as the most direct
Scripture testimony to the creation of matter: ^jq^f. direct
" Through faith we understand that the worlds were proof.
framed by the word of God, so that things which are seen were not
made of things which do appear." ^ The former part of the text
seems rather to give the sense of a formative creation of worlds.
This is the more natural sense of the words, " the worlds were
framed by the word of God " — Kar-qQriax^ai rovg alojvag prjiian 6eov.
Special account is made, however, of the latter part: " So that
things which are seen were not made of things which do appear" —
elg TO fiT] EK (paivofievuv rd iSXendneva yeyovevat. There may be a
question respecting the construction of these words. Such a ques-
tion is raised, but it is one which does not materially affect the
sense. Bloomfield, after treating the construction, says: " Thus
the sense is that 'the world we see was not made out of apparent
materials, from matter which had existed from eternity, but out of
nothing; so that, at His fiat, the material creation was brought
into existence, and formed into the things we see."^ Dr. Hodge
holds much the same view. After a review of the construction,
he concludes: " Whatever is real is phenomenal ; that is, every sub-
stance, every thing which really exists, manifests itself somewhere
and somehow. The proper antithesis, therefore, to (paivofxevcov is
ovK 6vr(ov. ' The worlds were not made out of any thing which
reveals itself as existing even in the sight of God, but out of
nothing.'"^ There is another text classed with this one as at
once illustrative and affirmative of the same sense of creation :
" God, who quickeneth the dead, and calleth those things which
be not as though they were." ° His calling things which are not as
though they were may be taken in the sense of his divine fiat which
' Macdonald : Creation and the Fall, pp. 64, 65.
"^ Ibid., p. 245. ^ Heb. xi, 3. '' Greek Testament, in loc.
* Systematic Theology, vol, i, p. 560. ® Eom. iv, 17.
286 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
causes or can cause them to exist and serve his purpose. " God
calls TO, fiTj ovra just as he does ra dvra; things that do not now
exist are at his disposal as really and truly as things that do exist
— that is, they can be made to exist and to subserve his purpose, in
the same manner as things do Avhicli now already exist. If any
one still feels a difficulty, he may solve the sentence in this simple
way, namely, KaXovvrog ra iitj ovTa ojg [tftaAeaev] ovra — that is, call-
ing into existence (Gen. i, 2; Psa. xxxiii, 6) things that are not, as
[he called into existence] things that are. The sense would be for
substance the same. '" " For example, the centurion says to his serv-
ant, ... Do this; but God says to the light, whilst it is not in exist-
ence, just as if it were, Come forth, yevov, come into existence.
Think of that often-recurring and wonderful •'n% Gen. i ; it ex-
' presses the transition from non-existe7ice to existence, which is
produced by God calling." "
This interpretation cannot claim decisive authority, and for
the reason that some able expositors do not find in the words the
sense of an originative creation. Still, there is nothing forced or
Inconsistent in the interpretation, and the text may fairly be
claimed in support of the creation of matter.
There is another significant fact. There are in the Scriptures
manv references to the creative work of God: many
NO CONTRARY *^ ^ •/
INTIMATION OK sublimc dcscriptions of the greatness of that work, and
SCRIPTURE. ^£ ^j^g greatness of God in its achievement; much of
detail in these descriptions; lofty expressions of his majesty and the
absoluteness of his power, of his eternity in distinction from the
temporariness of all other existences; but in all this there is not
the slightest reference to any eternally existing matter which he
used in framing the heavens. This total omission is out of all con-
sistency with such an existence.
In other spheres of existence, particularly in those of life and mind,
the proof of an originative creation is clear and full. Science can
give no account of the origin of either life or mind. In the light of
reason, as in the light of revelation, both originated in the creative
agency of God. With this clear truth, there is the less reason to
question the creation of matter; or, rather, the former facts of an
originative creation should be accepted as quite decisive of the latter.
Ill, Several Spheres of Creation.
Our discussion of Theism unavoidably anticipated much that
might properly be treated under the present heading. Hence little
' Stnart : On Romans, in loc.
' Bengel : Gnomon of the New Testament, in loc.
SEVERAL SPHERES OF CREATION, 287
more is here required than to present the several questions in
the light of Scripture. This limitation will avoid unnecessary-
repetition.
1. The Physical Cosmos. — Out of a primordial chaos came or-
derly worlds and systems. The transformation was the work of
God in a formative creation. This is the sense of the Scriptures in
many passages. They open with the account of such a creation.'
God spreadeth out the heavens; maketh Arcturus, Orion, and
Pleiades, and the chambers of the south. ^ The heavens declare
the glory of their Creator, and the firmament showeth his handi-
work.' By the word of the Lord were the heavens made; and all
the host of them by the word of his mouth." Of old he laid the
foundations of the earth; and the heavens are the work of his
hands." He stretcheth out the heavens as a curtain, and spread-
eth them out as a tent to dwell in; and as we lift our eyes to the
heavens we behold the worlds which he created." He hath made
the earth by his power, he hath established the world by his wis-
dom, and hath stretched out the heavens by his discretion.' The
same truth is in the Xew Testament. The earth and the heavens
are the creation of God, and therefore the manifestation of his per-
fections." We have given the substance of a brief selection of texts
which present the creative v/ork of God in the orderly constitution
of the earth and the heavens. "What we have given may suffice,
especially as the same truth must appear in other texts of creation
which include the living orders of existence. After the creation of
matter, the work of God within the physical realm is simply forma-
tive in its mode. The discrete and confused elements are set in
order; chaos is transformed into a cosmos. In this there is no
originative creation, but only a constitution of orderly forms.
2. Living Orders of Existence. — The divine creation of these
orders is the explicit word of Scripture. "And God said. Let the
earth bring forth grass, the herb yielding seed, and the fruit-tree
yielding fruit after his kind, whose 'Seed is in itself, upon the
earth: and it was so.^' "Let the waters bring forth abundantly
the moving creature that hath life, and fowl that may fly above
the earth in the open firmament of heaven." " Let the earth bring-
forth the living creature after his kind, cattle, and creeping thing,
and beast of the earth after his kind: and it was so."'"" These
were successive creative fiats of God; and the living orders were the
product of his own divine energizing. "Thou, even thou, art
' Gen. i, 1-8. - Job ix, 8, 9. ^ pga. xix, 1.
•» Psa. xxxiii, 6. ^ Psa. cii, 25. * Isa. xl, 22, 26.
■> Jer. X, 12. ^ Eom. i, CO. " Gen. i, 11, 20, 24.
288 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
Lord alone; thou hast made heaven, tlie heaven of heavens, with
all their host, the earth, and all things that are therein, the seas,
and all that is therein." ' " Lord, thou art God, which hast made
heaven, and earth, and the sea, and all that in them is."' These
verses, written in far later periods, are cast in the mold of the
Mosaic cosmogony, and clearly express the truth of creation re-
specting tlic living orders of existence.
In organic structure these forms of existence are profoundly dis-
tinct from all crystalline and chemical forms, and con-
TlIE LIVING . _ '' _ _ '_ _
HIGHER THAN stltutc a lilglicr order. Life is a profound differentia-
tion. Sentience and instinct still deepen the distinction.
They constitute higher orders of existence than any mere physical
forms. It is entirely consistent with these facts that their origin
is in distinct and specific acts of creation. The creative work
which brought the physical elements out of confusion into order
was not in itself the origination of these organic and living orders.
This is the sense of Scripture, as manifest in the texts previously
given. Only by further and distinct energizings of the divine will
did they receive their existence.
Life is a mystery. All concede this. Neither the scientist nor
the philosopher has any more insight into its inner
nature than the rustic. Its reality, however, is above
question. Its energy is great, its activities intense. So effective
an agent must be a profound reality. Science gives no account of
its origin. AVhatever the arrogance of assumption a few years ago,
for the present there is little jiretension to any merely physical or
naturalistic origin. The origin of life is accounted for in the cre-
ative agency of God. In the light of reason, as in the light of
Scripture, this is its only original. The case is only the stronger
with the sentience and marvelous instincts of the animal orders.
Hence the divine creation of the living orders of existence was more
than a mediate or merely formative creation ; it was an immediate
or originative creation, which gave existence to life, with its dis-
tinctive facts in the higher orders of animal existence.
3. Man. — The origin of man is in a further distinct act of crea-
tion. It is accompanied with forms of expression and action wliich
mark its significance. After the completion of all other works,
the sacred record is: "^ And God said, let us make man in our
image, after our likeness: and let them have dominion over the
fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle,
and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth
upon the earth. So God created man in his own image, in the
' Neh. ix, G. « Acts iv, 24.
SEVERAL SPHERES OF CREATION. 289
image of God created he him; male and female created he them." '
The separate creation of man is further expressed in the more
definite statement of its manner. " And the Lord God formed
man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the
breath of life; and man became a living soul."^ Here are the two
modes of creation: one mediate in the formation of the body; the
other immediate in the origination of the mind. There are in the
Scriptures many references to this distinct creation of man. The
sense is really the same whether his origin is referred to the crea-
tive agency of God or to his Fatherhood.^
Materialism, in whatever form of evolution, exposes its weakness
in any and every endeavor to account for the origin of
•' -' _ , . » MAN AN IM-
man and the faculties of mind. It 1.3 only by the un- mediatkcrea-
warranted and unscientific assumption of missing links
that even his physical evolution from lower orders can be alleged.
The difficulties are infinitely greater in respect to mind. The
powers of mind go differentiate it from all else in the realm of nat-
ure, so elevate it above the plane of all other forms of existence,
that its naturalistic evolution is a manifest impossibility. Only the
creative agency of God can account for the origin and existence of
mind. This question, however, properly belongs to the anthropo-
logical argument for theism, where its fuller discussion may be
found.
4. An(/eh. — Science, as such, knows nothing of angels. They
have no connection with any sphere whicli brings them within her
observation. The question of their pxistence and origin, as of
their character and rank, is purely one of revelation. It is reason-
able to think that the limits of living and rational existences are far
wider than this world, which is but a speck among the magnitudes
of the physical universe. Spectrum analysis discloses a physical
composition of other worlds similar to our own. "With this fact of
likeness, it is not to be thought that all those worlds lie forever
waste — without form and void. It is reasonable to think many of
them are the homes of living orders; and of the higher as of the
lower. The lower forms point to the higher. As in this world man
completes the orders of life, and is their rationally necessary culmi-
nation, so we must think of rational beings as completing the scale
of living existences in other worlds. In a universe originating in
the wisdom and power of God the existence of angels, such as ap-
pear in the light of revelation, is entirely consistent with the
highest rational thought.
1 Gen. i, 26, 27. - Gen. ii, 7.
^Num. xxvii, 16 ; Ecel. xii, 7 ; Acts xvii, 29 ; Heb. xii, 9.
30
290 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
All that we know of the angels we learn from the Scriptures.
Many interesting facts are given. For the present, how-
KNowN'^oNi.r ever, their creation is the definite point. Their nature
iNTHEscRiPT- j^^] officcs, with tlicir distinction as good and evil, will
CRES. , ,1111
be treated elsewhere.
On the ground of Scripture, their origin in a divine creation is
a manifest truth. Yet of this there is no definite statement. It is,
however, a clear implication. As finite existences originating in
time, they could have no other origin. Their creation is implied
in the fact that they are angels of God, and particularly in the
definite and impressive manner in which this fact is expressed in
the Scriptures.* It is equally implied in their own adoring wor-
ship of God as the Creator of all things.' The same truth is given
in those comprehensive texts which attribute to God the creation
of all things in earth and heaven. There is one more direct text :
" For by him were all things created, that are in heaven, and that
are in earth, visible and invisible, whether they be thrones, or
dominions, or principalities, or powers : all things were created by
him and for him.'" The creation of the angels is here included in
the all things in heaven, and particularly in the all invisible things,
which expression discriminates them from the visible forms of
existence in this world. It is still more definitely given in the
specific terms, thrones, dominions, principalities, powers, which
clearly designate angelic orders of existence."
AVhen the angels were created is a question on which the Script-
WHEN CRE- "res are silent. If their creation has any place in the
ATED. cosmogony of Moses, it must be in the first verse of
Genesis. To place it there would require the sense of the verse to
be so broadened as to include the whole work of creation. This is
hardly permissible, because it would break the proper historic connec-
tion Avith the following verses. Neither the time of their creation
nor its inclusion in the Mosaic record is in any sense necessary to the
interpretation of Scripture. It is neither unscriptural nor unreason-
able to think of the angels as created long before the formation of this
world. Such a view is not without Scripture ground. It seems no
forced interpretation that the morning stars and the sons of God which
sang together over the founding of the world were the holy angels.'
' The deeply interesting facts of Scripture respecting the angels should not
be omitted. Yet they neither directly concern any vital doctrine of theology
nor claim any place in a logical ord^r of doctrines. The question of the angels
is therefore assigned to an appendix to the second volume.
2 Gen. xxviii, 12 ; Luke xv, 10 ; Heb. i, 6. ^ Rev. iv, 11.
* Col. i, 16. =■ Eph. i, 21 ; 1 Pet. iii, 22. •* Job xxxviii, 4-7.
SEVERAL SPHERES OF CREATION. 291
Whenever the creation of the angels took place, it must have
been a creation in the deepest sense of origination. We must not
anticipate their nature and qualities beyond the requirement of this
particular point ; but as they appear in the light of Scripture it is
manifest that they are specially spiritual beings, with very lofty in-
tellectual and moral powers. As such, they are not a formation
out of existing material, but a divine origination in the very essence
of their being.
IV. The Mystery of CREAxioisr.
1. Mystery of Immediate Creation. — A mediate or formative
creation is so common in the history of civilization, so manifest in
its manifold works, and, indeed, so deeply wrought into our experi-
ence, that the sense of mystery is mostly precluded. The great
achievements in mechanics may often surprise us as to the powers of
man, but without perplexity as to the modes of his operation.
With this familiarity of a merely formative creation
through our own agency, there is the less perplexity for ^„h form-
our thought of such an agency in God. Yet for our ^tive crea-
° . . . TION.
deeper thought there is still a profound difference m
the two cases. We mostly work through mechanical means ;
whereas God as a purely spiritual being must work by an imme-
diate power of personal will. There is still some light for our
thought in the facts of consciousness. We surely know the imme-
diate energizing of our personal will. This energizing is not the
less immediate for the reason that the action is first upon our bod-
ily organism, and then through it upon exterior nature. With the
simple spix'itual essence of mind, we must at some initial point
exert an immediate power of will upon the physical organism. To
deny this is to assume for all forms of our personal action an abso-
lute mechanical law. Eeflective thought, with the facts of personal
consciousness in clear view, must ever reject this law. It is true
that we thus reach an immediate power of will only upon our own
bodily organism, and without the faintest insight into its mode ;
yet even so much is of value for our thinking of the formative crea-
tions of God. With the distinctive fact of a physical organism, we
may yet see in the light of our own immediate power of will the
reality of an immediate power of the divine will which can so act
upon the elements of matter as to set them in their orderly forms.
With this power, the formative creations of God are clearly pos-
sible.
The profound mystery is in the notion of an immediate creation
of essential being. If we but think a little, it must appear that
292 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
any notion of such being as an actual existence is a profound mys-
MTSTKRY ov ^^^^^ ^^^^^^ ^^6 thought of sucli a reality, the alterna-
oRKJiNATivE tlvcs of an eternal existence or an origination in time
inevitably present themselves. Neither is comprehen-
sible in thought. Yet we are shut up to the reality of eternal
being. There is no escape either in the extremest idealism or in
the baldest positivism. Eternal being is for us an absolute truth.
This alternative, however incomprehensible, has ever been accepted
in reflective thought. So constant and thorough is this conviction
that the possibility of an originative creation never appears in
human thought apart from the light of revelation. In all heathen
thought, even in its profoundest philosophic forms, matter itself is
either eternal or in some inexplicable mode an emanation of the
very nature of God. Even with the light of our biblical theism,
we need have no reserve in conceding the utter mystery of an orig-
inative creation of matter. Objectors, who must admit the utterly
incomprehensible reality of eternal being, are in no position to
question the possibility of such a creation. The mystery for our
thought is no disjjroof of the possibility.
2. Dee2Jer Mystery of Emanation. — The profound mystery of an
originative creation of essential being has induced not a few minds,
and even some Christian minds, to accept the notion that things
wliich appear as real and individual existences are an emanation or
evolution out of the very nature of God. Sir William Hamilton
ii)K\ OK KMA- "^^^ represent this view. With him the annihilation of
NATivK CRKA- bclug Is just as inconceivable as its origination: "We
are utterly unable to construe it in thought as possible
that the complement of existence has been either increased or
diminished. We cannot conceive, either, on the one hand, noth-
ing becoming something, or, on the other, something becoming
nothing. When God is said to create the universe out of nothing,
we think this by supposing that he evolves the universe out of him-
self ; and, in like manner, wo conceive annihilation only by conceiv-
ing the Creator to withdraw his creation from actuality into power." '
All this is grounded in the principle that nothing can come from
nothing, and nothing be reduced to nothing — for the. forcible ex-
pression of which the author cites the words of Lucretius and Persius.'
The ancient and familiar formula, ex nihilo )iihi!Jit — from noth-
^ Philosophy (Wight's), pp. 493, 494.
- ' ' Nil posse creari
De Nihilo, neque quod genitu 'st ad Nil revocari ; "
" Qigni
De Nihilo Nihil, in Nihilum Nil posse reverti."
THE MYSTERY OF CREATION. 293
ing nothing is or can be — is true in its principle, but may be false
in its application. It is true in respect to all events ;
....,,, . APPLICATION
and in such application it is thoroughly validated by ofexnihilo
the law of causation. Whether this law so validates ^'hilfit.
Hamilton's doctrine of creation is the very question in issue. The
creation of the universe out of nothing never can mean, and is
never intended to mean, that nothing is in any sense wrought
into the material of the new existence. Further, the creation of
the universe out of nothing is, in the sense of Christian theism,
totally different from the notion of its springing from nothing. In
the antecedents for thought there is the infinite difference between
an absolute void and the omnipotent God. The notion of an orig-
inative creation through his agency is in no violation of the law of
causation. The sufficient cause of the new existence is given in the
potential plenitude of the Creator.
The notion of an absolute complement of being, forever without
possible increase or diminution, from which the doctrine
f . ' . . NO ABSOLUTE
is deduced of an emanation or evolution of the universe complement
out of the very nature of God, must be monistic in o^ being.
principle. Otherwise, it must involve an eternal dualism, or even an
eternal pluralism of existences, according to the distinctions of essen-
tial being. Materialism is monistic, but, as utterly atheistic, it has
no part in this question. Monism is the ground-princijDle of pan-
theism. Nor is the deduction of a mere phenomenal character of
all sensible forms of existence illogical. Hamilton admitted no
such an implication of his doctrine of creation, but it is much easier
to deny than legitimately to escape such an implication. A doc-
trine of creation which lies so near the deepest and most determin-
ing principle of pantheism cannot give the true sense of the Script-
ures respecting the origin of the universe. Further, if this doctrine
of an evolutionary creation be true of matter, it must be equally
true of mind, whether human or angelic. Mind is thus reduced to
a merely phenomenal mode of existence, without any reality of be-
ing in itself. For otherwise the veiy being of God must be divided
into many parts. It thus appears that this doctrine lies close to the
emanation of souls out of the nature of God as maintained in Brah-
manism — entirely too close to be true to the Scriptures.
The heading of these paragraphs signifies a deeper mystery of an
evolutionary than of an originative creation. With the
pure spirituality and infinite personal perfections of mystery op
God, such must be the fact. True, we cannot think kmanative
. T • 1 CREATION.
how either matter or mind is originated. Can we thmk
how either can be evolved out of the very nature of God? If we
294 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
know any thing, we know the reality of our own personal being.
"We cannot be such through a mode of evolution except by a divi-
sion of the divine nature. If matter is an evolution, either it
must express the eternal nature of God or be the subject of an
essential mutation, which is equivalent to an originative creation.
These facts fully justify our heading. As one turns back from the
mystery of an originative creation to the evolution of the universe
out of the nature of God, he does but plunge into a deeper mystery.
3. Evil Tendency of Emanative Doctrine. — The doctrine of an
emanation or evolution of finite existences out of the nature of God
is not new to speculative thought. In its deeper principle, as Ave
have seen, it underlies pantheism. In widely prevailing pagan re-
ligions, souls are an emanation of God, and destined to a re-absorp-
tion into his nature. Such an evolution of matter was deeply
wrought into the gnosticism which appeared as a malign heresy in
the early history of the Church. There was a long series of emana-
tions, on a scale of degradation, and terminating in matter. Mat-
ter was thus viewed as intrinsically evil, and the inevitable source
of moral evil. In these latter facts, matter was much the same in
the Greek philosophy; in which, however, it was held to be a dis-
tinct eternal existence, not an evolution out of the nature of God.
The tendency of the doctrine in both was evil, and only
OF ASCETIC OR ,,_,... . "^
TIC10U3 TEND- cvil. lu rcligion, its tendency is to asceticism, but with
^^^^' an easy diversion into a life of vicious indulgence.
Apart from religion, the primary tendency is to such a life. With
an intrinsically evil nature and a consequent absolute helplessness,
there is a ready excuse for the grossest vices ; and only the more
ready with this evil nature as an emanation of God.
"With a true Christian theism, of course such consequences are
denied. It is hardly thinkable that, with the evolution
CHRISTIAN • »
THEISM NOT o^ finltc cxisteiices out of the nature of God, such a the-
A FULL COR- igjn can be maintained or held in any clear view. In
RECTIVE
any case, the law of moral duty and responsibility may
be greatly weakened. If in our whole being, as consisting of soul
and body, we are an evolution out of the being of God, and there-
fore of his very nature, why should not such a nature be the law of
our life? The clear view and deep sense of God as revealed in
Christianity would reject such an implication ; but that view and
sense may easily be obscured and weakened; and the direct tend-
ency of such an origin of our nature in God must be toward such
obscurity and weakness.
4. Mode of Divine Agency in Crealiny. — The question thus
raised specially concerns tlie providence of God, but is also properly
THE MYSTERY OF CREATION. 295
in place here. Forces, and the power of God as well, are in their
deeper nature still secret to our thought, but there are clearly no-
ticeable distinctions in their operation. The mode of agency must
in all cases be determined by the nature of the agent. We may
thus distinguish between personal agency in man and physical
agency in matter. If we cannot reach the secret of physical forces,
we yet know their reality in the energy of their operation, and that,
on the proj)er collocation of material elements, they act immediately
and necessarily. Such is the law through all the forms of physical
force. In distinction from this law, personal agency in man is
through an optional energizing of the will. Still, in our present
condition there can be no putting forth of power to act upon exterior
nature except through our physical organism. There are exigencies
of experience when we are deeply conscious of this inability. Such,
however, is simply the fact of a present limitation, and it does
not follow that in an unbodied state we can have no such power.
Much less could such limitation of the divine will thus
A PURELY
follow. God is a purely spiritual being, and, hence, personal
whatever power ho puts forth, whether in an originative ^genct.
or in a formative creation, must be purely spiritual, and, therefore,
only through the energy of his personal will. Any other sense of
creative agency in God is contradictory to both his spirituality and
personality, and must sink into some form of pantheism.
Such a mode of the divine agency in the work of creation is widely
pervasive of the Scrij^tures. We read it in the forms of the sense ok
the divine fiat as given in the narrative of creation; ' in s^-ripture.
all the texts which attribute the work of creation to the word of
God.^ This view of the divine agency is profoundly important in
both a doctrinal and practical sense. It is the only view which can
secure for our faith and religious consciousness the personality of
God and liis transcendence above the realm of nature.
5. Freedom of God in Creating. — There is observable in both
philosophical and theological thought a strong tendency toward the
necessitation of God in his creative work. Various grounds are
alleged for this necessitation, some of which may properly be no-
ticed.
The ground with some is that some form of existence objective
to God was necessary to his personal consciousness. God ^^ necessity
could not come to the knowledge of himself except in to his con-
this mode. Therefore creation was for him a necessity. ^* 'o^^^"'"'-
This assumption is beyond any warrant of our reason. Personal
' Gen. i, 3, 6, 9, 11, 14, 20, 24.
^ Psa. xxxiii, 6, 9 ; Heb. xi, 3 ; 2 Pet. iii, 5.
296 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
consciousness in man may bo conditioned on some distinct and ob-
jective existence. If it be true, as mostly accepted, that tlie incep-
tion of our own consciousness is in sensation, seemingly an objective
existence, as the condition of sensation, is necessary to our conscious-
ness. This, however, may be a requirement only for our present
embodied state. "We cannot aCirm it as a law for all intelligences.
Much less can we affirm it as a necessary law for the divine con-
sciousness. The difference between the finite and the infinite pre-
cludes such an affirmation. Further, tliere are weighty objections
to this assumed necessity for the work of creation. The assumption
implies a purpose of God in creating — a purpose that through an
objective existence so created he might come to sclf-consciousnccs.
These ideas are inconsistent. There can be no such purpose with-
out personal consciousness. Tliis leads to further objection. If
an objective existence was necessary to the coming of God into a
jDersonal consciousness, it follows that such consciousness could not
arise until aftor his creative work. Therefore creation could not
be his personal work, for there can be no personal agency without
consciousness. Neither could there be intelligence, motive, or aim
in the work of creation. In a word, the existence of the world and
the universe must be without a divine teleology. "We should thus
surrender all that is distinctively theistic in the conception of
creation.
Some find the necessary source of finite existences in a plcni-
x.« v,.r..-c,.,.r^ ^^^^^ of the divine nature which muct overflow, and
oFTiiK DivixK which does overflow in the creation of such forms of
existence. Such a view is utterly irreconcilable wdth
any teleological conception of creation. The personal agency cf
God is whelmed in the necessary activities of his nature. Nor
can such a view be reconciled either with the time-origin of the
universe or with definite instances of origination. Such a pleni-
tude in God, if assumed at all, must be assumed as eternal.
Therefore there should have been an eternal outflow of finite
existences, while in fact they are clearly of time-origin.
Many, especially in the lino cf theological thought, find in the
V. ^ .. « o . . nature cf God a moral necessity for his creative work.
N 0 M 0 R A L ^ ^ "^
NECKssiTT OF It Is wlsc aud good to create; therefore God as eternally
cRLATioN. ^-g^ ^^^^ good must create. *' By far the most common
opinion from the beginning has been that th.e creation is to be re-
ferred to the honitns, the goodness, benevolence, or, as the modern
Germans at least generally express it, the love of God. As God is
love, and the nature of love is to communicate itself, as it must
have an object to be enjoyed and rendered blessed, so God created
THE MYSTERY OF CREATION. 297
the worlJ that ho might rejoico iu it and render it hlessed/'' It
the wisdom and goodness of God necessitated the work
° IMPLICATIONS
of creation, it follows that this world, and every other of such ke-
as well, must be the best possible. This was definitely ^^^^''^'^•
the doctrine of Leibnitz,* and in complete logical concistency
with such a stand-point. The whole view u open to criticism. It
is open to the same insuperable objection as previously alleged
against another assumed ground of necessitation. Yricdom and
goodness, as of the very nature of God, must be eternal in him.
Therefore, if they are assumed to necessitate his creative worli, there
must be conceded an eternal necessitation. This is utterly irrec-
oncilable with the time-origin of the world, and especially with
the very recent origin of man. Farther, if God must create that
he may communicate his love to his creatures and render them
blessed, it follows that his creative efnciency should bo the only
limit of his work. We are in no position to affirm any such im-
plied extension. Finally, ii, as an implication of the ground-prin-
ciple, this is the best world possible, it further follows that every
other world must be precisely the same. There is no proof of any
such sameness, but decisive indications of the contrary. Clearly,
the angelic orders are very diiTerently constituted from mankind.
The reasoning which we thus criticise seems plausible, but it pro-
ceeds upon lines which run out far beyond the possible reach of
our thought, and hence we cannot bo sure of the conclusion. The
facts which we can grasp seem decisive against it. If no sen-
tient being, or no rational being, with capacity for higher blessed-
ness, had ever been creatod, there would have been no wrong to
any. Nonentities have no rights.
The freedom of God in creating is a requirement of his personal
agency therein. Personal agency and free agency are j^e^lity op
really the same; and there is no clearer truth in Script- thk mviNE
ure than the personal agency of God in the work of fkekdom.
creation. Creation has a purpose and a plan. All things were
created in the divine pleasure, and for the manifestation of the
divine glory,^ to the end that men might know God and live to
him as their supreme good.* Personal agency in such work must
be free agency. Hence no necessity could have determined the
creative work of God. His freedom therein was absolute.*
' Hodge : Systematic Theology, vol. i, p. 566.
^ TheocHcee.
^Rev. iv, 11 ; Psa. xix, 1.
* Acts xvii, 24-2S ; Rom. i, 19, 20.
^ Cocker : Theistie Conception of the World, pp. 62-66.
298 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
Y. Mosaic Cosmogoxy and Science.
1. Jlistoric Character of the Mosaic Narrative. — So ancient and
remarkable a document could not escape a most searching criticism.
A chief aim of such criticism has been to discredit its historic
character. Thus it has been treated as a compilation of more an-
cient documents, which contained the traditional notions of crea-
tion; as a poetic ellusion; as a mythical or allegorical composition;
as a philosophical speculation of a devout Hebrew upon the origin
of the world. In such modes it has been attempted to discredit
the Mosaic narrative of creation.
There are no decisive proofs of a compilation. Nor would such
QUESTION OF A ^ ^^^t affcct tho cliaractor of the narrative, unless it
COMPILATION, could be proved to have only a pagan source. There
ie no proof of such a source, but niuch disproof. In some pagan
cosmogonies there are points of likeness to the Mosaic, but also
points of very marked difference. The pagan, as Taylcr Lewis
points out, have a pantheistic cast, and are as much theogonies as
cosmogonies.' Tlie definite and lofty thcictic concej^tion of the
Mosaic determines for it a distinct and higher source. The ques-
tion of a compilation is quite an indifferent one with those who
maintain the historic character of this narrative. Tliis is the posi-
tion of thorouglily orthodox and conservative divines. A com-
pilation, while not complete in originality, may be thoroughly gen-
uine and historical.
Nor is this narrative a poetic effusion. It might be poetic, and
NOT A poKTic yet truly historical. It is not a poem either in form or
EFFUSION. style. *' But every thorough Hebrew scholar knows
that in all the Old Testament there is not a more simple, straight-
forward prose narrative than this first chapter of Genesis."'
*' There is certainly poetry in other parts of the Bible, and the
opening account might have been in the same style, designed like
all other poetry, to excite strong emotion — to impress us feelingly
with the thought of the wisdom and goodness and greatness of the
First Cause, Avithout claiming exact credence for the literal prosaic
truth of the representations employed for such 'an emotional pur-
pose. But the opening narrative of the Bible has not the air and
style of poetry, although the subsequent Hebrew poets have drawn
largely upon this old store-house of grand conceptions, and thereby
thrown back upon it something of a poetical tinge." ' Dr. Strong
' The Six Dai/s of Creation, p. 287.
* Terry : Biblical Hermeneutics, p. 548.
" Lewis : The Six Days of Creation, pj). 18, 19.
MOSAIC COSMOGONY AND SCIENCE. 299
says: " The first chapter of Genesis lacks nearly every element of
acknowledged Hebrew poetry. " '
Against the assumption of a mythical or allegorical cast of this
narrative we may place the decisive evidences of an his- ^^^ ^ ^^^^^^ ^^
torical character. " We have no difficulty in detecting allegory.
these styles — the mythical and parabolical — in the Scriptures
wherever they may occur. When we meet with such a passage as
this — ' The trees said to the bramble, Eule thou over us ' — or,
* Thou hast brought a vine out of Egypt and planted it ' — or, ' My
beloved had a vineyard in a very fruitful hill ' — or, ' A sower went
forth to sow, and as he sowed some seed fell by the wa3^-side ' — we
have no trouble in determining its character. Every intelligent
reader, whether learned in the original languages or not, says at
once, if he understands the terms, this is myth — this is parable —
this is allegory — this is poetical or figurative language. We fail to
detect any of these well-known marks of style in the account of
the creation. It professes to narrate the order of facts, or the
chronological steps, in the production of our present earth. It is
found in Scriptures well known to have existed in our Saviour's
day — Scriptures with which he was familiar, which he styled holy,
and to which He, the Light of the world, appealed as of divine,
and, therefore, unerring, authority. Whatever, then, be its fair
meaning, that meaning, we say again, is for the believer the actual
truth, the actual fact or facts, the actually intended teaching; and
is to be received as such in spite of all impertinent distinctions be-
tween the natural and the moral, or any arbitrary fancies in re-
spect to what does or does not fall within the design of a divine
revelation."*
" If we pass to the contents of our account of the creation, they
differ as widely from all other cosmogonies as truth „ ^ „ „ „
•^ O , PROOFS OP
from fiction. Those of heathen nations are either historic
hylozoistical, deducing the origin of life and living be- '^"^^^'^t'^^-
ings from some primordial matter; or pantheistical, regarding the
whole world as emanating from a common divine substance; or as
mythological, tracing both gods and men to a chaos or world-egg.
They do not even rise to the notion of a creation, much less to the
knowledge of an almighty God, as the Creator of all things. . . .
In contrast with all these mythical inventions, the biblical account
shines out in the clear light of truth, and proves itself by its con-
tents to be an integral part of the revealed history, of which it is
accepted as the pedestal throughout the whole of the sacred Script-
■ McClintock and Strong : Cyclopaedia, " Cosmology."
^ Lewis : The Six Days of Creation, p. 19.
800 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
\irc3.'" **Xot a iow, r.3 Eichhorn, Gabler, Baur, and others,
have here fouud a so-called philosojjJncal mytli, wherein a highly
cultnrcd Israelite has given us the fruit of his reflections as to the
origin of all things, clothed in the form of history. That, how-
ever, neither the contents, nor the tone, nor the place of the nar-
rative of creation speaks in favor of this construction is at once
apparent to every ono. Ey all later men of God, as also by Jesus
and his apostles, the contents thereof are manifestly regarded as
history. The form in which t!ie gcnccis of all things is here
clothed can be just as little explained from the mythical stand-
point as can the particular object contemplated by the anonymous
thinker. ... By what fatal accident came the thinker on the
genesis of the world, who stood so much higher than the most re-
nowned philosophers, to remain unknown to posterity? Assuredly',
' the historical account which is given there bears in itself a full-
ness of speculative thoughts and poetic glory; but it is itself free
from the influences of human philosophemen: the whole narrative
is sober, definite, clear, concrete.^"'
The facts thus given respecting the Mosaic narrative are deciEivo
of its historic character. There could be no other in-
T II E A 1 M
CLEARLY IMS- tcution tliau to give the facts of creation in an orderly
TORicAL. form. Any other vicvr severs the connection of this
narrative with the remainder of the book, which is clearly intended
for history. Indeed, the whole stream of biblical history is cut oH
from its fountain. Its similarities to some other cosmogonies may
point to an earlier record more or less common to itself and them,
but its own profound distinctions and incomparable superiority
assert for itself a divine original v.'hich tl:o others cannot claim.
2. Tlieories of Mosaic Consistency with Science. — With the his-
torical character of the Mosaic narrative, the question arises
respecting its consistency with science, particularly with geol-
ogy. It is now above question that gcobgy discloses a process of
cosmogony running back through measureless ages; whereas the
Mosaic cosmogony is seemingly brought within a few thousand years
of the present time. This apparent discrepancy in time is the real
question of adjustment. "When the great age of the world, and not
only as a physical body, but in manifold forms of life, came to be
manifest in the light of geology. Dr. Chalmers met the issue with
the declaration that " the writings of Mosos do not fix the antiquity
of the globe ; and that if they fix any thing at all, it is only the
antiquity of the human species." At a later period, and with the
' Keil and Delitzsch : On Oenesis, pp, 39, 40.
'Vim Oosterzee : C^:rifitiin Dogmatic!^, vol. i, p. 319.
MOSAIC COSMOGONY AND SCIENCE. 30I
work of tlie six days in view, he said : '' The first creation of the
earth and the heavens may have formed no part of that Vv'ork. This
took place at the 'beginning , and is described in the first verse of
Genesis. It is not ciid v/hcn the beginning was/" This position
was not wholly new, though mainly so to modern Christian thought.
The chief merit of Chalmers, as concerned in this question, lies in
his ready apprehension of the issue involved, and in his prompt and
confident enunciation of the principle cf adjustment. There is no
other principle. Yet, while the only one, it is open to different
modes of application. It is only in the application that a distinc-
tion of theories appears in the reconciliation of Genesis with geology.
One mode of adjustment, and the one that Chalmers propounded,
proceeds on a distinction cf creations as es;pressed in
*■ _ ^ JL , THEORY OF
the first verse of Genesis, and in the account of the six two crea-
days. There was " in the beginning '^ a creation of the ^'^^^'
heavens and the earth. This is the creation the date of which is
not fixed, but v,^hich is assumed to provide for all the ages of geol-
ogy. Then there was a second and more recent creation; so recent
as to accord with biblical chronology. In the further development
of the theory it is maintained that, after long ages of geological
history, a cataclysmic disturbance reduced the world to a formless
and void mass. All forms of life perished. Some at least hold this
view, while others may be less positive of so utter a desolation. Then
followed a second and modern creation, the products of which are
man and the forms of life cotemporary with him. This creation
was the work of six literal days, as detailed in Genesis, and within
the reach of biblical chronology.' Such is one mode of reconciling
the Mosaic cosmogony with geology. If the facts are as posited,
the reconciliation is complete.
There is another theory of reconciliation, which, however, is but
a modification of the previous one. The same facts of
■1 . . . THEORY OF A
two creations are posited, but the desolation which local, mod-
preceded the modern creation of the six days was only ^^^ creation.
local. After the long ages of geological history arising out of the
first creation, with all the actualities of life which this history dis-
closes, a portion of the earth, most likely in south-western Asia,
suffered an inundation which destroyed all forms of life therein,
and reduced it to a state of chaos. This local section was the scene
of the second creation as detailed in the six days of the Mosaic
record. These were literal days, and man, with the forms of life
more directly related to him, the product of this creative work.
' Cited by Macdonald : Creation and the Fall, pp. 82, 83.
' McClintock and Strong : Cyclopcedia, ' ' Cosmogony. "
302 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
Again tlio reconciliation is complete, if the facts are as given in
this modified view.'
There is a third mode of reconciliation, which agrees with the
previous ones in that the Scriptures do not fix the an-
vTe^we'd^Is tiquity of the earth, but differs from them in other
GEOLOGICAL leading facts. This theory holds the Mosaic and
geological cosmogonies to be the same, and provides for
the harmony of the two records in the element of time by an exten-
sion of the days of creation into geological ages. Such is the dis-
tinctive fact in this third mode of adjustment. If such extension
is warranted, or even permissible, the adjustment may be accepted
as entirely satisfactory. "We know not any other than these three
modes of bringing the two records into harmony. There are
attempts in fanciful methods, which may be passed without notice.
3. Concerning a Second and Modern Creation. — Most that can
be said for this mode of adjustment is that it preserves the literal
sense of the days of creation, which, upon the face of the record,
seems to be their true sense, and, further, that it answers to the
reason for the Sabbath as given in the fourth commandment. It
will hardly be pretended that there are interior facts of the records
which require such an interpretation. The theory is open to the
question whether the interior facts, and the facts of geology as
well, are not against the interpretation.
It is surely difficult to read the ideas cf this interpretation
into the Mosaic narrative, or into the many refer-
OF TiiK FinsT ences of Scripture to the work of creation, i lirough
THEORY. ^i^g whole there runs the sense of an original and com-
pleted "work, with an unbroken continuity. The absolute silence
of Scripture respecting the long ages of life between the crea-
tion of the first verse of Genesis and the chaos of the second, the
complete overleaping of these ages, and the introduction of a
second and modern creation, while the narrative reads just like a
history of unbroken continuity, are facts which it is most diffi-
cult for the theory to dispose of on any admissible laws of interpre-
tation. There are also very serious diHiculties for the theory in the
facts of geology, particularly in the unbroken continuity of life
since its first inception in the creative work of God.
Against the modified form of the theory, which posits a local chaos,
and a local second and modern creation, there are in-
DIFFICrLTIKS . . « i i • i
OF THE SECOND supcrablc objections. The continuity of the history is
THEORY. sundered. The grand march of the narrative perishes
in the disruption. The sublime work of a universal creation sinks
' Pye Smith : Scripture and Geology / Murphy : On Genesis, chap. i.
MOSAIC COSMOGONY AND SCIENCE. 303
into the narrow limits of a local one. The creative /a^f, " Let there
be light," has no higher meaning than a clearing up of the local
atmosphere, so that the rays of the sun might again reach the local
scene of the second creation. This narrow sense cannot be recon-
ciled with the narrative which places the creation of light and
appoints the sun as its perpetual source before the creation of the
higher forms of life. Such is the order of facts in the narrative
and in the requirement of geology. The theory robs the creation
of light of its profound meaning and lofty sublimity. Hugh Miller
might well say : ''I have stumbled, too, at the conception of a
merely local and limited chaos, in which the darkness would be so
complete that, when first penetrated by the light, that penetration
could be described as actually a making or creating of light."'
The theory requires unwarranted and inadmissible changes in
the use of r^>?n — ^'^^ earth. In the first and second f^-rther dif-
verses of Genesis the word clearly means the same ficulty.
whole earth, whereas for this theory it means in the second only a
small section, reduced again to a state of chaos. Then the theory
must force the same narrow sense upon the term in other places which
utterly refuse it.^ '' The heavens and the earth, and all the host
of them," of the former, and '^Hieaven and earth, the sea, and all
that in them is," of the latter, are clearly the creation of the six
days, and such expressly in the latter. It is impossible to reduce
such a creation to the narrow sense of this theory.^
4. Mosaic Days of Creative Worh. — The question is, whether
these are literal days, as now measured to us, or indefinite and pro-
longed periods. The latter are the proper alternatives of the
former; for if we depart from the literal sense, the length of the
days becomes entirely subordinate to the order of divine works in
the process of creation.
Mostly the Christian interpretation of these days has given them the
literal sense. Recently, however, there are many excep-
•" ' , . . '■ COMMON IN-
tions. It may gratify the rancor of infidelity to attribute terpeetatiox
this change to an exigency created by the disclosures of ^^ ^^^'
modern science. Such an occasion may readily be admitted, while
all sense of serious perplexity i3 denied. While the Scrijotures are
divine, their interpretation h human, and new facts may help to a
truer rendering. However, the now rendering is new only to the
common view of the later Christian centuries. All along the cent-
uries, and without any exterior pressure, such a sense has been.
given, and by most eminent Christian authors — for instance,
' Tcstitnony of the Rocks, p. 156. ' Gen. ii, 1 ; Exod. xx, 11.
° Macdonald : Creation and the Fall, pp. 86-91.
304 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
Augustiue and Aquinas. Other names are given by ]\Iivart,' and
also by Cocker.' An indefinite and prolonged duration of these
days is not therefore a new meaning forced upon Christian interpret-
ers by the discoveries of modern science, but an earlier one wliicli,
in the view of many, the interior facts of the narrative required.
On a casual reading of this record, the days of creation would be
„,„ „ ,^ taken in a literal souse. In this case, however, as in
DIFFERENT ' '
jiEAxiNcis OF many others, a deepsr insight may modify the firet
^^^' view. The queation has no decision, on purely philo-
logical ground, for the reason that DV — yom — is used in both a
definite and indcfinit3 sense. E^specting the farmer use there is
no question. A fow instcaccs by reference m?.j suffice for t]ie
latter.' As yo7n — dr.y — is so frequently used in both senses, we
must look to the connection for its meaning in any pr,rticular place.
In the verse where the word first appears it is need for different
periods: one, the period of light; the other, the period of the dark-
ness and the light.* For the first three days there was no ruling
office of the sun to determine their time-measure. !Mor is there
any apparent law of limitation to a solar measure. There is nothing
in the direct account of these three days against the sense of indefi-
nite and long periods. This is the most rational interpretation.
"With this fr.ct, it seems clearly permissible so to interpret the
remaining tliree days.
5. The Six Days and the Sabbath. — The reason for the Sabbath,
as given in the fourth commandment,^ is specially urged against an
indefinite sense of the days of creation. The point is made that
the force of the reason for the Sabbath lies in the literal sense of
the days of God's working. If this be valid, the literal scnco must
be true of all the six. It is impossible, however, as v/e have seen,
to fix tliis sense in the first three. Further, if this reason for the
Sabbath requires definite solar days of God's Avorking, it muct
equally require such a day of his resting, and also a resumption of
his work at its close; for his resting as much concerns this reason
as his working. Such a consequence proves the groundlessnees cf
this argument for the literal sense of the days of creation.
If the grounds of the Sabbath were the same for God as for man
GRocxDs OP there might be some force in this argument. There is,
THE SABBATH, bowcvcr, uo sameness, not even a similarity, of grounds
in the two cases. We need the Sabbath on both physiological and
' Lessons from Nature, pp. 141, 1!2.
' Theistio Conception of the V/orlcl, pp. IZO, IZl.
* Gon. ii, 4 ; Job xiv, 6 ; loa. xii, 1 •, II:cr.h iv, 1.
<Gen. i, 5. ^Exod. xx, 11.
MOSAIC COSMOGONY AND SCIENCE. 305
moral grounds — not to name many others. There is no such need
in God. Work does not weary him. His resting has no sense of
recuperation or repose. Nor is the Sabbath any requirement of his
moral nature. Hence the reasons for its observance arising out of
his example cannot require a limitation of the days of his working
and resting to a deiinite solar measure. That God wrought through
six periods in the upward progress of his creative work and then
ceased, however indefinite or long the days of his working and rest-
ing, gives all the reason for the Sabbath, as arising out of his exam-
ple, which is expressed in the fourth commandment.
G. Consistency of Genesis and Geology. — We have presented the
three leading modes of reconciling the Mosaic narrative of creation
with the disclosures of geology. While we much prefer the third,
and think the others open to objection, we know that they have the
preference and support of some leading minds. Were they the only
resource of Christian exegesis, it would not be forced into any very
serious strait. With the sense of ages for the Mosaic days, which
we have found clearly permissible, the reconciliation is complete.
Scientists find an accordance between the two records which,
beyond the attainment of consistency, proves the divine original of
the Mosaic.
It may be objected that scientists are rarely philologists, and the
obiection might have weight if this were purely a ques-
. . ^ , "^ -_." 1TV . REQUIREMENTS
tion of philology. It is not such. Nov is any profound for treating
attainment in philology requisite to an intelligent treat- "^"^ qi-estion.
ment of the question. Only one word is directly involved. As it
is used in different senses, its meaning in any particular place must,
as we have seen, be found in its connections. These connections
are open to clear eyes, even without a profound philology. It is not
thus conceded that the learned in biblical philology are generally
against the age-sense of day in the Mosaic record. Far from it.
Neither is proficiency in science generally, or in geology in particu-
lar, necessary to an intelligent treatment of this question. The
leading fact to be known is that the geological history of the vrorld
is a record of long ages, and, Avith this, some clear view of the suc-
cessive stages of its upward progress. One may know all this with-
out being a geologist in any scientific sense. Hence Dr. Cocker,
with the requisite knowledge of science and philology, though
skilled in neither, might with propriety treat the question as a
philosopher. This he has done with rare ability, and with a result
which leaves no apparent conflict between science and the Mosaic
cosmogony.'
' Theistic Conception of the World, chap. v.
21
30G SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
Macdonald and C. H. Hitchcock have treated the question rather
EXPOSITORY as theologians or expositors, but with an intelligent ap-
TRKATMKNT. prehcnsiou of the facts concerned, as embodied in the
cosmogony of science. The former, after a comparison of the two
cosmogonies, says : "It is not too much to assert that the harmony
above traced, and the peculiarities of the Mosaic narrative of crea-
tion, botli as regards manner and matter, are explicable only on the
principle that the Creator of the earth, of its rocks and mountains,
its rivers and seas, plants and animals, is also the Author and
Source of this record of the wonderful production of his almighty
power."' Dr. Hitchcock holds, with many others, the rather poetic
view of a revelation of the Mosaic cosmogony through a process of
daily visions. This allowed him a primary literal sense of the days ;
which, however, he holds in a symbolical form. Time-symbols
frequently occur in Scri^sture. There is such a use of day or days
and other time-measures in prophetic utterance.'' As future events
were prophetically expressed in a symbolical use of days, so in a
like use the successive stages of creation were retrospectively ex-
pressed. Further, as the events which fulfill the prophecies reveal
the symbolical sense of their time-measure, so the age-sense of day
in the narrative of creation is revealed in the light of modern sci-
ence. It is this sense which enables the author to find in Genesis
the cosmogony of science. "A review of the work of creation as
described in nature and revelation convinces us of the essential
harmony of the two records."' This is the conclusion after a full
comparison of their respective contents.
Eminent scientists, proceeding with the sense of geological ages
TKKATMENT BY '^^ thc days of crcatiou, not only find no serious contra-
sciKXTisTs. riety between Genesis and geology, but do find a mar-
velous accordance in the cardinal facts of the two records. Such
facts are placed in parallel columns, that the agreement may at
once be clear to the eye and the clearer in the mind. This is no
" deadly parallel " for Moses, but the proof of a divine original of his
cosmogony. Its great facts were, in his time, beyond the reach of the
human mind, and remained so until within a century of the present.
Only the divine mind could then have communicated these truths.
Hugh Miller, thoroughly Christian in faith and life, was a man
of rare intelligence, and eminent in geology. He pro-
foundly studied and compared the cosmogonies of Gen-
esis and geology, so as to command the clearer view of their likeness
' Creation and the Fall, pp. 85, 86.
- Dan. viii, 14 ; ix, 24-26 ; xii, 11, 12 ; Eev. ix, 15 ; xi, 2, 3.
3 Bibliotheca Sacra, July, 1867.
MOSAIC COSMOGONY AND SCIENCE. 307
in the account of the successive stages of the world's creation. We
need not follow the author in this discussion, but may give the
result as reached in the full persuasion of his own mind. "■ Now, I
am greatly mistaken if we have not in the six geological periods all
the elements, without misplacement or exaggeration, of the Mosaic
drama of creation." '''Such seems to have been the sublime pano-
rama of creation exhibited in vision of old to
' The shepherd who first taught the chosen seed,
In the beginning how the heavens and earth
Eose out of chaos ; '
and, rightly understood, I know not a single scientific truth that mil-
itates against even the minutest or least prominent of its details."^
Professor Winchell was a distinguished scientist, and thoroughly
versed in the questions which concern the cosmogony of
Genesis. He also instituted a comparison, and found a
wonderful agreement between the two records. The upward prog-
ress and completion of the world as detailed in the two is, day for
day, substantially the same. " The author of Genesis has given us
an account which, when rightly understood, conforms admirably to
the indications of latest science." After a further unfolding of the
two records, Winchell says : " Now compare the work of these
' days ' with the events of the seven ' periods ' before indicated, and
judge whether the correspondence is not 7'eal, and, indeed, much
greater than we could expect of a history written in an age before
the birth of science, and (according to the popular chronology)
3,500 years after the close of the events which it narrates.""
The eminence of Dr. Dawson for scientific learning is well known.
He, too, finds a '^ parallelism of the scriptural cosmogony
with the astronomical and geological history of the earth,"
at once illustrative and confirmatory of the former. After a thorough
study and lucid comparison of the two histories, he gives the result,
modestly, indeed, but clearly without any hesitation in his own
mind : " The reader has, I trust, found in the preceding pages
sufficient evidence that the Bible has nothing to dread from the
revelations of geology, but much to hope in the way of elucidation
of its meaning and confirmation of its truth."'
On this question Professor Dana has coupled the name of Pro-
fessor Guyot with his own : " The views here offered, and the fol-
lowing on the cosmogony of the Bible, are essentially those brought
' Testimony of the Rocks, pp. 204, 210.
** Reconciliation of Science and Religion, pp. 358, 361.
' Origin of the World, p. 859.
808 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
out by Professor Guyot in hie lectures. " ' Dana repeats this state-
DANA AND Hient iu a fuller treatment of the biblical question.'
ouYOT. -^Yg ^]^^g jiaye the common view of two very distin-
guished scientists.' ''Professor Dana, of Yale, and Professor
Guyot, of Princeton, belong to the first rank of scientific natural-
ists ; and the friends of the Bible owe them a debt of gratitude for
their able vindication of the sacred record. " * The details of this
yindication must be passed simply with the references. Both hold
the age-sense of day in the Mosaic record, and in the discussion
there is disclosed a wonderful harmony between the cosmogonies of
science and Genesis ; a harmony which is explicable only with the
divine original of the latter. " The order of events in the Script-
ure cosmogony corresponds essentially Avith that — of science — which
has been given." "The record in the Bible is, therefore, pro-
foundly philosophical in the scheme of creation which it presents.
It is both true and divine. It is a declaration of authorship, both
of creation and the Bible, on the first page of the sacred volume.
There can be no real conflict between the two books of the Gkeat
Author. Both are revelations made by him to man — the earlier
telling of God-made harmonies coming uj) from the deep past,
and rising to their height when man appeared, the later teaching
man's relations to his Maker, and speaking of loftier harmonies in
the eternal future."'
' Manual of Geology, p. 472.
* Bibliotheca Sacra, January and July, 1856.
'Rev. J. O. Means gives a formal statement of Guyot's doctrine in Biblio-
theca Sacra, April, 1855.
* Hodge : Systematic Theology, vol. i, p. 573.
^ Dana : Manual of Geology, pp. 744, 746.
General reference. — Much of the literature of theism, as previously given,
relates to the question of creation. The question is discussed in works on sys-
tematic theology and commentaries on Genesis ; and the later more directly
meet the issues raised by modern science.
Pearson : Exposition of the Creed, article i ; Howe : The Oracles of God, part
ii, sec. 2 ; Dwight : Theology, sermons xvii-xxii ; Venema : System of TJieology,
chap, xix ; Martensen : Christian Dogmatics, sees. 59-78 ; Hodge : Systematic
Theology, vol. i, part i, chap, x ; Van Oosterzee : Christian Dogmatics, sees.
56-58 ; Shedd : Dogmatic Theology, Theology, chap, vii ; Oehler : Theology
cf the Old Testament, jiart i, sec. 2 ; Ladd : Doctrine of Sacred Scripture,
part ii, chap, ii ; Hickok : Creator and Creation ; Macdonald : Creation and
the Fall ; Lewis : The Six Days of Creation ; Lange, Murphy, Delitzsch, Dods,
Quarry, severally on Genesis ; Buckland : Bridgeivater Treatise ; Miller : Foot-
irrints of the Creator; Murchison : Siluria; Mantell : Medals of Creation;
McCausland : Sermons in Stones ; Cook : Religion and Chemistry ; Fraser :
Blending Lights ; Agasaiz : Structure of Animal Life ; Herschel ; Discourse on
Natural Philosophy.
GOD IN PROVIDENCE. 309
CHAPTEE X.
GOD nsr PROVIDENCE.
A PKOVIDENCE of God is very fully revealed as a fact. The
Scriptures are replete with expressions of his govern-
ment. These expressions are given in such terms of truth of
universality, and with such detail, that nothing is scripture.
omitted. God rules in all the realms of nature, and in their mi-
nutiae as in their magnitudes. A few texts will verify these state-
ments. God's power sustains and rules the mighty orbs of heaven,'
The heavens and all their hosts, the earth and the sea, with all
they contain, are the subjects of his preserving and ruling provi-
dence.'^ The thunder and the lightning are his; the frost and hail
and snow, and the warm winds which dissolve them, are the de-
termination of his hand.^ His showers water the earth, soften the
furrows, and bless the springing corn.'' He cares for the falling
sparrow, and numbers the hairs of our head.^ Such is the provi-
dence of God as revealed in the Scriptures.
The idea of a providence is not in itself an obscure one. It ap-
pears in the light of our own experience and observa- simple as a
tion. We see it in the government of the State, or in *"^^'^-
the offices of the ruler of the State. This sense of providence is
expressed in the New Testament." The idea is yet more clearly
and impressively given in the parental care of the family. In the
government of the children, in the watch-care over their interests,
in the provisions for their good, there is a true parental providence.
With such facts ever jiresent in our own life, it is easy to rise to the
idea of a divine providence. God is the Creator of all things, our
own Creator and Father. He must care for the works of his own
hands, even for those without any capacity for either pleasure or
pain. Much more must he care for the forms of existence with
such capacity. This care must be providential in its offices. We
are his offspring and sustain to him the intimate relation of chil-
dren. Nor are little children in deeper need of the parental care
than we are of the providential ministries of the heavenly Father.
There is no reason to doubt his care for xis. The idea of his provi-
J Isa. xl, 26. ^ Neh. ix, 6. » Job xxxvii, 2-11.
* Psa. Ixv, 9, 10. ^ Matt, x, 29, 30. « Acts xxiv, 2.
310 SYSTEM A.TIC THEOLOGY.
dence is just as simple and assuring as the idea of that parental
providence which we see in our human life. We read this mean-
ing in the words of the psalmist: " Like as a father jjitieth his
children, so the Lord pitieth them that fear him. For he know-
eth our frame; he rememboreth that we are dust."' We read it
more 'clearly and deeply in the words which Christ addressed to his
disciples for their assurance in the trying experiences of this life:
" Your Father knoweth that ye have need of these things."" But
the providence of God is thus viewed merely as a fact; and it is
only in this view that it is clear and simple.
It is useless to assume for this question a simplicity which is not
„,„„, „„ real. It is equallv useless to attempt a concealment of
DIFFICULT FOR , . .
DocTiuNAL its perplexities. They appear all along the history of
TREATMENT. ^^^ doctrlual treatment. Nor are they any less in the
more recent issues of the question. Difficulties appear in the di-
versities of doctrinal view.
Questions arise respecting the nature and extent of the divine
agency in the preservation and government of the universe. The
answers widely differ. In pantheism God is the only operative
force, but as a nature without personal agency. The position of
theism must consistently be directly the opposite. The providen-
tial agency of God is purely and only jjersonal. As personal, it
must be through the rational energizing of his will. On this point
theists have not always been sufficiently definite. There is a doc-
trine of the divine immanence which does not keep sufficiently
clear of the pantheistic view. While the personality of God is still
maintained, the view that his divine nature as a universal presence
is a universal energy finds too much place in the doctrine of provi-
dence. Answers differ respecting the extent of the divine agency
as well as respecting its mode. The differences range along the
whole line from the negative position of deism to the position
that God is the only force operative in nature. Again, the answers
differ as to whether the divine agency alway3 operates in harmony
with the laws of nature, or whether it sometimes so departs from
these laws as to prevent their natural results, or to attain results
which could not otherwise be achieved. The point is not here to dis-
cuss these several views, but simply to note them as signs of the diffi-
culties which beset the doctrinal treatment of the divine providence.
The difficulties of a doctrinal treatment have been increased by
iMPMCATio>f it^ implication with questions of modern science. If,
WITH SCIENCE, as souic scicutists maintain, the spheres of animate
and rational life are one with the material, and all subject to an
' Psa. ciii, 13, 14. - Luke xii. 30.
LEADING QUESTIONS OF PROVIDENCE. 311
absolute continuity of physical causality, there is no place for the
providence of God as a personal agency. There is in the order of
nature, especially, within the physical sphere, a uniformity which
is seemingly the determination of purely natural forces. The ques-
tion thus arises whether there are such forces, and, if so, whether
their operation may be, and sometimes is in fact, modified by the
divine agency. All such questions now concern the doctrine of
providence.
Another question of difficulty arises from the relation of provi-
dence to our free moral agency. It is clear that with-
° -^ . RELATION TO
out such freedom there can be neither moral obligation free moral
nor responsibility. Both, however, are realities above ^<^-^ncy.
any reasonable questioning. Moral freedom must be a reality.
Hence the real question is the adjustment of such a freedom to
the offices of a divine providence in our human life. To many
minds this adjustment may seem very simple and easy, but the
history of opinions on the question does not warrant such a view.
There is still the difficulty, and perhaps the most perplexing of
all, arising from the magnitude of evil, physical and ^he magni-
moral. Only a complete theodicy could fully adjust TUDEofEviL.
such evil to the doctrine of providence. There is no present at-
tainment of such a theodicy. However, the truth of a divine provi-
dence is not so conditioned for our faith. It is so conditioned only
for the full comprehension of our reason. This is not necessary to
a fully warranted and very sure faith. While there may be no
complete explication of present evils, the proofs of a beneficent
providence may be clear and sure. The same is true respecting all
other questions of perplexity.
I. Leadixg Questions of Providence.
The divine providence cannot be formulated under any single
law, nor as operative in any single mode. This is obvious in view
of the many spheres of its agency. As we found it helpful to dis-
tinguish the spheres of God's creative work, so may we find it help-
ful to distinguish the spheres of his providential work. There is
ample ground for such distinction, and for the analysis of the ques-
tion. In this method we may relieve the doctrinal treatment of
much perplexity, and in the end attain a clearer view of providence.
We need the statement of some general facts as preparatory to the
more definite analysis.
1. Providential Conservation and Government. — The doctrinal
treatment of providence recognizes botla a conserving and a ruling
agency. This is the first distinction to be noted, and the broadest
yi2 SYSTEMATIC THEOL'^GY.
and deepest of all. There is ample ground for it in the Scriptures,
and also in the nature and relations of created existences.
A conservative providence of God is clearly expressed in the
PRoviDKNTiAi, Scrlpturcs. As the creation of all things, and of all
coNSKiivATioN. jq ^i^q Kiost comprehcnsive sense, is ascribed to God, so
is their preservation: "And thou preservest them all.'" "0
Lord, thou preservest man and beast." ^ He calleth by name the
hosts of heaven, the stars of tlic firmament, and uphokleth them
by his great power, so that not one faileth.^ " For in him we live,
and move, and have our being." * " And he is before all things,
and by him all things consist." *
It is the sense of Scripture, in many places and in many forms
A RULING °^ expression, that all things are subject to the ruling
PROVIDENCE, providence of God. The earth and the heavens, the
forces of nature, the seasons of the year, the harvests of the field,
the fruits of tlio earth, the powers of human government, the allot-
ments of human life are all thus subject. It is needless to cite,
or even to give in substance, the many texts, or even a selection
of the many, which contain this truth. A brief reference may
suffice. "
In the reigning and ruling of the Lord there is the sense of a
universal governing providence. The texts which express this
truth are not merely prophetic of an ultimate universal dominion,
nor restricted to the idea of a distinctively spiritual kingdom, but
give the sense of a present and perpetual government of all things.
"^ Thine, 0 Lord, is the greatness, and the pov/er, and the glory,
and the victory, and the majesty: for all that is in the heaven
and in the earth is thine; thine is the kingdom, 0 Lord, and
thou art exalted as head above all. Both riches and honor come
of thee, and thou reignest over all ; and in thine hand is power
and might; and in thine hand it is to make great, and to give
strength unto all."' "He ruleth by his power; his eyes behold
the nations: let not the rebellious exalt themselves."" "The
Lord hath prepared his throne in the heavens; and his kingdom
ruletli over all."' "And I heard as it were the voice of a great
multitude, and as the voice of many waters, and as the voice of
mighty thunders, saying, Alleluia: for the Lord God omnipotent
reigneth." '"
'Neh. ix, 6. '' Psa. xxxvi, 6. »Isa. xl,26. ■» Acts xvii. 28. *Col. i. 17.
«Job V, 10; ix, 4-10; xxxvi, 26-i52 ; xxxvii, 6-18; Psa. Ixxiv, 12-17;
civ, 1-30 ; cxxxv, 6, 7 ; Isa. xlv, 7 ; Jer. v, 23, 24 ; xxxiii, 20, 25 ; Joel ii,
21-27; Matt, vi, 25-34; Acts xiv, 17.
'1 Chrou. xxix, 11, 12. "Psa. Ixvi, 7. 'Psa. ciii, 19. '"Rev. xlx, 6.
LEADING QUESTIONS OF PROVIDENCE. 313
The nature and relations of created existences point to the dis-
tinction between the preserving and ruling offices of conservation
providence which we find in the Scrii^tures. Even the and govern-
conservation of the orderly forms of material existences ^"'^^ °'
carries with it the sense of providential government. Otherwise,
we must think this perpetual order the determination of original
laws of nature, without any perpetual agency of God. This is the
baldest deism, false to the Scriptures, and offensive to the religious
consciousness. The distinction we make is yet more manifest in
the relations of providence to the sentient and rational forms of
existence. The uniformities of nature are of great value to both,
but absolute uniformities would often be at painful odds with their
interests. If the sustenance of the living is with the providence of
God, the forces of nature must be subject to his sway. For the
interests of the human race there must be a ruling as well as a pre-
serving providence.
2. Universality of Providential Agency. — We here need little
more than a statement of this universality. It has already appeared,
especially in the explicit words of Scripture. If we hold a prov-
idence of God in any proper sense, we must rationally think it
universal. The special reason for its present statement lies in its
intimate relation to the further analysis of the question of prov-
idence. The more extended the field of providence the more
numerous are the spheres of its agency, A proper distinction of
these spheres is necessary to the analysis of the question.
3. Distinction of Providential Spheres. — The two spheres of
God's preserving and ruling providence are commensurate in their
universality, but distinct for thought, and really distinct for the
manner of the divine agency therein. There is also the distinction
between material being and its orderly forms; and the divine agency
in the preservation of the one and in the preservation and govern-
ment of the other must give rise to different questions in the doc-
trinal treatment. Again, there is the distinction between the
material and animate spheres, wherein there are different questions
for the doctrinal treatment of providence. Finally, there is the
profound distinction between free and responsible personalities, on
the one hand, and all the lower forms of existence, on the other.
With such distinctions in the spheres of providence there must be
distinctions of mode in the divine agency.
4. Distinctions of Providential Agency. — We have prepared the
way for these distinctions by the statement of the different spheres
of providence. The conservation of matter as being — if there be
such an office of providence — and the conservation of its cosmical
;iU SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
forms mu^t be through different modes of the divine agency. In
the first that agency can have no respect to eitlier the spatial rela-
tions or the dynamical qualities of the elements of matter, while in
the second it must have exclusive respect to such relations and
qualities. There is thus in tlie second a governing agency which
determines the collocations of matter or directly modifies the work-
ing of ito forces, while there is no place for such a manner of agency
in the first. From the purely material, whatever its mechanical
or chemical form, we pass into a new and higher form of existence
in the sphere of the animate. There is a new and higher force
in the living organism. The agency of providence must be in ad-
justment to this new and higher force and to the definite forms in
which it works. Forces themselves are hidden from our immediate
view, but the manifest difference between the orderly forms of the
merely physical and the organic forms of the living clearly points
to a distinction of providential agencies in the two spheres. Finally,
there is the jirofound distinction between personal mind and all the
lower forms of existence. With this distinction, there cannot be
the same law of providential agency for the former as for any sphere
of the latter.
Nothing is yet concluded or even discussed resj)ecting the work-
ins: of providence in the different spheres of finite
AIM OK PRKVI- or 1
oL-s DisTiNf- existence. The aim has been to justify the position
TioNs. ^1^^^ ^i^g divine providence cannot be formulated under
any single law, nor as operative in any single mode. It must
be studied and interpreted in view of the manifold and diverse
spheres in which it may be operative, "What may be the truth of
a providence in one may not be the truth in another. If it should
even appear that in some one sphere there is no evidence of a prov-
idence, it would not follow that there is no providence in others.
If it could be made clear that God is the only force operative in
material nature, it would not follow that there is neither power nor
personal agency in the human mind. Hence an absolute prov-
idence in the former would leave the way open for a very different
mode of the divine agency in the latter. An absolute continuity in
the order of physical sequences could not disprove a divine prov-
idence within the realm of mind. Such facts are of value in the
study and interpretation of providence in the different spheres of
its agency.
II. Providence in the Physical Sphere.
1. Concerning Ihe Conservation of Matter. — There is a preserv-
ing providence within the sphere of physical nature. This, as
PROVIDENCE IN THE PHYSICAL SPHERE. 31.5
previously shown, is the clear sense of Scripture. There is for this
sphere a universal conservation. But as so revealed it is simply
the fact of a divine conservation, without any such absolute uni-
versality or specific application, that it must hold in being the very
essence of matter as well as preserve its orderly forms. Yet such a
view is prominent in the history of doctrinal opinion. The as-
sumption is that if matter were left without the up- ^he common
holding power of God, even for an instant, it would '^'ew.
in that instant fall into nonentity. Hence its continued existence
must be through the unceasing conservation of his power. This is
the common view. ''The conception of the divine conservation of
the world as the simple, uniform, and universal agency of God
sustaining all created substances and powers in every moment of
their existence and activity is the catholic doctrine of Christen-
dom."' It should be noted that this citation includes spiritual
being just as it does the material. This is i^roper, and not only as
a requirement of accuracy in the statement, but also as a require-
ment of consistency in the doctrine ; for if the doctrine be true
respecting the essence of matter it must also be true respecting the
essence of mind.
Widely as this doctrine has prevailed, we cannot think it closed
against all questioning. In order to any proper view the view
we must distinguish between the essence of matter and questioned.
its orderly forms. The former existed in the jjrimordial chaos ;
the latter are the product of the formative work of God. It may
be very true that but for his preserving power these orderly forms
would quickly relapse into chaos, but it does not follow that the
matter itself must also fall into nonentity. This profound dis-
tinction has been overlooked, and the question has been treated
just as though the essence of matter and its orderly forms were in
one dependence upon . providence for their continued existence.
That it should be so seems against reason. Being, even material
being, is a profound reality, and must have a strong hold on exist-
ence. It has no tendency to fall into nothing which only omnipo-
tence can counterwork. Instead of saying that only the power
which created matter can hold it in being, we would rather say
that only such power could annihilate it. What is thus true of the
essence of matter must be equally true of the essence of mind.
There is nothing in this view in any contrariety either to the
sense of Scripture or to a proper dependence of all things upon
God. There is no text which isolates the essence of either mind or
matter and declares the dependence of its continued existence upon
' Cocker .- Theistic Conception of the World, p. 176.
310 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
an upholding providence. As we recur to the texts which reveal
J the conserving providence of God we see that he up-
o.- THiNus NOT liolds tlic cartli and the heavens, not, however, as mere
ijin.sTioNKD. jnasses of matter, but as worlds of order in the truest
cosmical sense. God " preserves man and beast," but as organic
structures, with life and sentience, and also with personality in
the former. Further, as matter is the creation of God, and con-
tinues to exist only on the condition of his good pleasure, and is
wholly subject to his use for the purposes of his wisdom, it is in a
very profound sense dependent upon him. There is also a like
dependence of mind. Such a dependence satisfies all the require-
ments of both reason and Scripture.
2. Vieio of Conservation as Continuous Creation. — From the
notion of a dependence of finite being, which for its conservation
momentarily requires such a divine energizing as originally gave it
existence, there is an easy transition into the notion of a continuous
creation. Such a notion early appeared in Christian thought, and
has continued to hold at least a limited place. Illustrious names
are in the roll of its friends. Augustine is reckoned in the list.
His own words so place him.' Aquinas is definitely with Augus-
tine."
We may add the name of Edwards, who has given the real and
VIEW OF ED- f^^^l content of this doctrine. " It follows from what
WARDS. has been observed that God's upholding created sub-
stance, or causing its existence in each successive moment, is
altogether equivalent to an immediate production out of nothing,
at each moment ; because its existence at this moment is not
merely in part from God, but wholly from him, and not in any
part or degree from its antecedent existence. For the supposing
that its antecedent existence concurs with God in efficiency, to pro-
duce some part of the effect, is attended with all the very same
absurdities which have been shown to attend the supposition of its
producing it wholly. Therefore the antecedent existence is noth-
ing, as to any proper influence or assistance in the affair; aTid con-
sequently God produces the effect as much from nothing as if
there had been nothing before. So that this effect differs not at
all from the first creation, but only circumstantially; as in first
' " Deus, oTijns occulta potentia cnncta penetrans incontaminabili prsesentia
facit esse quidqiiid alicjiio modo est, in qiiantumciimque est ; quia nisi faciente
illo, non tale vel tale asset, sed prorsus esse non posset." — De Civitate Dei, lib.
xii, cap. XXV.
' ** Conservatio rerum a Deo non est per aliquam novam actionem, sed per
continuationem actionis qua dat esse." — Sumina Theol., p. i, qu. civ, art. i.
PEOVIDENCE IN THE PHYSICAL SPHERE. 317
creation there had been no such act aud effect of God's power
before; whereas^, his giving existence afterward follows preceding
acts and effects of the same kind in an established order.""
The sense of this passage is open and full. We know what the
author means by the conservation of existences as a continual cre-
ation. No doubt such a formula has often been adopted without
any clear apprehension of its meaning. The true sense is implied
in the citations from Augustine and Aquinas, but it is not brought
into clear view, and their words might be used with much less
meaning. No one can mistake the meaning of Edwards. Nor
has he overstated the sense of a continual creation. If v/e allow
the formula any distinctive meaning, it must be taken in the sense
of an iinmediate origination of existences. This is widely different
from a divine agency which constantly sustains their being. We
must suppose them momentarily to drop out of being and momen-
tarily to be re-created. The supposition may be most difficult,
but such are the implications of the doctrine. It must hold, not
only for essential being, but also for all orderly and organic forms
of existence, and equally for the human mind. In the treatment
of Edwards the latter was the special application of the doctrine.
With the full meaning and content of the doctrine thus brought
into view, it appears without the support of either (,jj,j,p,gjj ^j,,
reason or Scripture. If the doctrine be true, the thk kdwards-
present has no real connection with the past. There is
no continuity of being. In all the realms of finite existence, nothing
of yesterday remains to-day. All such existences of the present
moment perish, and new existences take their place in the next.
This has been repeated in all the succeeding moments since the
original creation. The fact is not other, that the new existences
are so like the old as to allow no distinction for sense-perception.
The new are absolutely new. Existences may be annihilated ; but,
once annihilated, they cannot be re-created. Thus in eveiy moment
since the beginning a universe has perished and a universe has
come into being. Then there was nothing profoundly distinctive
of 'the original creation. The only distinction, as pointed out in
the passage from Edwards, is merely circumstantial. The original
was merely the first, but not more really an originative creation.
When God said, "^Let there be light, ^' his creative act Avas not more
real than in the creation of light in the next moment and in every
moment since. Such a doctrine of providence cannot be true, and,
when fully understood, must sink beneath the weight of its own
extravagance.
1 Works, vol. ii, p. 489.
3 IS SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
There is not a word in Scripture which either supports or requires
NO GROUND IN ^^^^h a doctrinc. Many passages express the frailty and
scRiPTLKE. transience of some forms of organic existence, but with-
out any intimation that they abide but a moment or momentarily
sink into nothing, while new creations momentarily take their
place. Many forms of nature are described as permanent, abiding
through the centuries of the world's history. There is in the
Scriptures no conservation of finite existences in the sense of a
continuous creation.
3. Question of Physical Forces. — The question of natural forces,
such as we call mediate or secondary causes, deeply concerns the
doctrine of providence. Of course, the question here reaches beyond
matter as being, and specially respects its orderly forms. ' It is
only in these forms that forces emerge for rational treatment. If
there be natural forces, then the mode of providential
THE^QUESTioN ^'g^ucy Is iu tliclr support, in determining tlie colloca-
To PRO VI- tions of matter for their efficiency, and in co-working
with them for the attainment of chosen ends in the
cosmos. If there be no such forces, then God is the only efficience
within the physical realm. No exception can be made in the case
of human agency. It is true that man has greatly changed the face
of the physical world, but he has no immediate power over material
nature, and can work only through existing forces, which, on the
present theory, are purel}^ modes of the divine energizing. If this
theory be true, then all the forces operative in the physical uni-
verse, and none the less so the forces through which man works, are
the power of God. There is a profound distinction between a
divine agency working through natural forces and a sole divine
efficiency which determines all movement and change in the phys-
ical universe. So profoundly does the question of natural forces
concern the doctrine of providence.
There is no unity of view on this question. Not a few deny all
secondary causality and find in God the only efficient
PRESENT TEND- . . .
E N c Y OF agency in material nature." Seemingly the pres-
THouGHT. ^^^ tendency of theistic speculation is toward this
view. There is, however, no determining principle. The names
given in the note represent widely different schools of religious
thought, while among them ai'e theologians, philosophers, and
' "Dr. Samuel Clarke, Dugald Stewart, John Wesley, Nitzsch, Miiller, Chal-
mers, Harris, Young, Whedon, Channing, Martineau, Hedge, Whewell, Bascom,
Professor Tulloch, Sir John Herschel, the Duke of Argyll, Mr. Wallace, Proctor,
Cocker, and many among the ablest recent writers have defended this view."
— MoClintock and Strong ; Cyclopaedia, art. "Providence."
PROVIDENCE IN THE PHYSICAL SPHERE. 319
scientists. But others of the same schools hold just the opposite
theory. It thus appears that neither theology nor philosophy nor
science necessarily determines one's view on this question. It is
here that the treatment of providence is implicated with ques-
tions of physical science. This implication rather obscures than
clears the question. Nothing is more loudly trumpeted than the
very greats and recently very rapid, advancement of physical science.
Its achievements are specially noteworthy. After all, the uncer-
tainty and diversities of view on the question of physical forces
deny us all light on the question of providence. Physical science
within its own limit is purely empirical, and therefore cannot reach
the secret of force. Keason imperatively affirms an adequate force
for all the movements and changes in physical nature, but what that
force is, whether intrinsic to matter, or extraneous and acting upon
it, or purely of the divine energizing, empirical science cannot
know. We think that the question is beyond the reach of meta-
physics. It is not clear to our reason that physical nature is in
itself, and under all collocations of material elements, utterly
forceless.
The theory which denies all secondary causality in material nature,
and finds in God the only agency operative in the phys-
ical realm, is known in philosophic speculation as occasion-
Occasionalism. The principles were given in the ^^'®^'-
philosophy of Des Cartes, but were more fully developed and ap-
plied by his followers. Primarily the doctrine was more directly
applied to the bodily action of man. The mind could not act upon
the body. A volition to move the arm was not the cause of its
moving, but only the occasion on which the divine power deter-
mined its movement. In its broader application the doctrine denies
all interaction between material bodies. No one can determine any
change in another. The implication is the utter powerlessness of
physical nature, and that all changes therein are from the divine
agency. '
This question is entirely above the plane of empirical science.
Metaphysics cannot resolve it. The Scriptures are implications
silent as to any decisive Judgment, though seemingly of the prin-
against the doctrine. Yet the question is open to ^'''^'^'
rational treatment in view of its contents. The doctrine is the
utter forcelessness of physical nature, and that God is the only
force operative therein. We think it open to weighty objections.
We need not urge what others have urged, that it imposes an
immense drudgery upon God. The force of this objection is only
^ Morell : History of Modern Philosophy, p. 120.
320 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
seeming. There can be no drudgery for that which cannot weary ;
hence there can be no drudgery for omnijootence. This occasional-
ism must not be allowed any office which the doctrine really denies it.
The occasions are not only without all force, but are in no proper
sense conditions of the divine agency. The two are merely coincident
in time. Matter has no instrumental quality, and is really reduced
to a blank. It must be denied all the qualities, primary as well as
secondary, with which philosophy has been wont to invest it. With
these properties it could not be forceless. Gravitation, cohesive
attraction, chemical affinity, magnetism, electricity, without force
in themselves, are simply coincident with the divine energizing.
The lightning can have no part in riving the oak, the projected
ball no part in breaching the wall, for any such part is possible
only with the possession of force. The massive cables of steel which
seemingly uphold the Brooklyn Bridge have no natural strength of
support, but are the mere occasion of the divine energizing as the
sustaining power, and for which, so far as any natural strength
is concerned, threads of cotton might answer as well. Indeed, if
this occasionalism be true, there is no natural weight of the bridge,
which is possible only with a natural force of gravitation, and but
for a mighty downward pressure of the divine hand there would
be no weight to sustain.
In the implications of this doctrine there is no natural fitness of
FURTHER iM- physlcal conditions for vegetable production, none in
PLICATIONS. organic structures for any function of animal life. The
" tree planted by the rivers of water" has no natural advantage of
growth and fruiting over the tree planted in the most arid and bar-
ren earth. The richest harvest might spring as readily from the
sand of the desert as from the field of richest soil. The stomach
has no more natural fitness for the digestion of food than the
dish in which it is served. The system of nerves and ligaments
and muscular tissue, so wonderfully wrought in the living body,
has no natural fitness for animal movement. The structure of the
eagle gives no natural strength for flight, while there is no reaction
of the air against the stroke of his wings. All this must be true
if there be no forces of nature. There is no proof of such a doc-
trine; and in the light of rational thought the extravagance of its
implications is conclusive against it.
The mystery of natural forces is no valid objection against their
reality. We know not how they act. This, however, is no pecul-
iar case, but a common fact respecting the operation of force,
whatever its nature. How there can be interaction between ma-
terial entities, or how gravitation can act across the spaces which
PROVIDENCE IN THE PHYSICAL SPHERE. 321
separate the planets from the sun, we know not. Our own per-
gonal energizing through the will is specially distinct and clear in
the light of our consciousness, but only as a fact. How we thus
act is as hidden as the action of gravitation across such vast spaces.
Surely we cannot know how God puts forth power. There is no
profounder mystery than that the energizing of his will in the
purely metaphysical form of volition should act as a ruling force
in the physical universe. We escape no mystery by denying all
natural force and finding in God the only agency operative in the
material realm.
It is a weighty objection to this occasionalism that it leads to ideal-
ism and pantheism. As a forceless world can have no
-^ . . TENDENCY TO
effect upon our experiences, for us it can have no idealism and
reality. " The outer world is posited by us only as the ^^'^™^'^'^-
explanation of our inner experiences; and as, by hypothesis, the
outer world does not affect us, there is no longer any rational ground
for affirming it.'" The logical result is idealism. " In this one
affirmation, that the universe depends upon the productive poivcr
of God not only for its first existence, hut equally so for its con-
tinued leing and operation, there is involved the germ of the sev-
eral doctrines of pre-established harmony, of occasional causes,,
of our seeing all things in God, and, finally, of pantheism itself,
the ultimate point to which they all tend.""
4. Providence in the Orderly Forms of Matter. — The reality of
physical forces does not mean their sufficiency for either the origin
or the on-going of the cosmos. There is still an ample sphere for
the divine agency in supporting these forces, and in determining
the collocations of material elements which are the necessary con-
dition of their orderly efficiency. A true doctrine of providence
must accord with such facts — the reality of natural forces, and their
dependence upon God for their orderly working. Hence, as pre-
viously noted, the true doctrine must widely differ from any one
constructed on the assumption of an utter forcelessness of physical
nature. For the true doctrine we shall appropriate the statement of
a recent excellent work. It contains a few words seemingly not iu
full accord with our own views, but is so good as a THEORr of
whole that we omit all exceptions. " The theory which providence.
seems most consistent with all we know of God and nature is that
which supposes the Creator to have constituted the world Avith cer-
tain qualities, attributes, or tendencies, by which one part has a
causal influence on another, and one state or combination of j^arts
' Bowne : Metaphysics, p. 116.
"^ Morell : History of Modern Philosophy, p. 120.
322 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
produces anotlier, according to what we call laws of nature, the re-
sult being the co-ordination and succession of events which we call
the operations of nature. At the same time all nature is pervaded
by the living presence of God, sustaining the being and operations
of the world he has made and governs, retaining a supreme con-
trol which may at any point supersede or vary the usual course
of natural causation. Ordinarily he neither sets aside the causal
qualities of nature nor leaves them to themselves. This is the
reconciliation, if any were needed, of the primary and secondary
causes. God is immanent in natural causation, as truly and neces-
sarily as in natural being, in the operations as in the existence of
matter or mind." '
Any inference from the uniformity of nature against a provi-
dential agency within the sphere of physical forces is
axd^'hk'uni- utterly groundless. The two are not only entirely con-
FORMiTY OF sistent, but the latter is the only rational account of
the former. The denial of such consistency miist
either assume an absolute uniformity of nature as the determina-
tion of physical forces which leaves no place for the divine agency,
or that such agency must be capricious and the cause of disorder.
There is no ground for either assumption. If the processes of nat-
ure are wholly from the energizing of a blind and purposeless force,
there is no guarantee of an absolute uniformity. For aught we
know there may have been great variations in the past, and the
near future may bring an utter reversion of the present order of
things. We could know the contrary only by a perfect knowledge
of the blind and purposeless nature assumed to determine the
order of existences, which is for us an impossible attainment.
" Whether the members of the system will always continue, or
whether they will instantaneously or successively disappear, are
questions which lie beyond all knowledge. We do not know Avhat
direction the future will take in any respect whatever. The facts
in all these cases depend upon the plan or nature of the infinite;
and unless v/c can get an insight into this plan or nature, our
knowledge of both past and future must be purely hypothetical." "
Such result is inevitable if the infinite or ground of the finite is
assumed to be a blind and purposeless nature. There
UNIFORMITY . .. . ..., ^ • r
NOT FROM is no a priori necessitv of uniformity m the working of
''^''''^^- such a nature. AVhen Mr. J. S. Mill says, '' I am con-
vinced that any one accustomed to abstraction and analysis, who
will fairly exert his faculties for the purpose, will, when his imag-
' Randies : First Principles of Faith, pp. 232, 233.
' Bowne : Metaphysics, p. 139.
PROVIDENCE IN THE PHYSICAL SPHERE. 323
ination has once learned to entertain the notion, find no difficulty
in conceiving that in some one, for instance, of the many firma-
ments into which sidereal astronomy now divides the universe
events may succeed one another at random, without any fixed
law," ' he fully admits that the orderly course of nature is no ne-
cessity of physical causality, and hence that such order is entirely
consistent with the agency of a divine providence. When by such
a putting of the question Mill would unsettle the law of causation,
that every event must have an adequate cause, he utterly fails.
In the necessity of thought the movement of worlds at random, or
without any fixed law, would no less imperatively require a cause
than the movement of worlds in the order of a system. However,
the axiomatic truth of causation is only a formal truth, valid for
all events but without . the determination of any, while events
themselves, with their respective causes, are matters of empirical
or logical knowledge. It remains true that there is no absolute
uniformity of nature which must exclude tlie agency of a divine
providence.
In the light of reason, as in the sense of Scripture, the providence
of God is the ground and guarantee of the uniformities
which the system of nature requires. The requirement thk ground
is specially for the adjustment of the physical sphere to ^^ uniform-
the living and rational spheres. The physical, however
complete its mechanical order, has no rational end in itself, and
must find such an end in the interest of sentient and rational life.
" There only, where the possession, the preservation of being is
felt, can existence be considered as a good, and consequently as an
end to which a system of means is subordinated. What does it
really matter to a crystal to be or not to be ? What does it matter
to it whether it have eight angles in place of twelve, or be organized
geometrically rather than in any other way ? Existence having no
value for it, why should nature have taken means to secure it ?
Why should it have been at the expense of a plan and a system of
combinations to produce a result without value to any one, at least
in the absence of living beings ? So, again, however beautiful the
sidereal and planetary order may be, what matters this beauty, this
order, to the stars themselves that know nothing of it ? And if
you say that this fair order was constructed to be admired by men,
or that God might therein contemplate his glory, it is evident that
an end can only be given to these objects by going out of themselves,
by passing them by, and rising above their proper sphere. " " As in
the plan of God the physical system was constituted as preparatory to
' Logic, book iii, chap, xxi, sec. 1. ' Janet : Final Causes, pp. 156, 157.
,TJ4 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
the comiug of sentient and rational existences, so its orderly preserva-
tion is for their sake. " Physical and mechanical things being in
a general manner connected witli finality by their relation to living
beings, we conceive tliat tliere may thus be in the inorganic world a
general interest of order and stabilit}^ conditions of security for the
living beings." ' With such an original purpose in the constitution
of the physical system, there is a manifest reason for the providence
of God in its orderly conservation.
Thus the providence of God, so far from being in any contrariety
KRROROPcoN- ^0 the Orderly course of nature, is in fact the ground of
TRARYviEw. its uniformities. The contrary view arises from the
false notion that a diviue agency within the course of nature must
be capricious and disorderly. Nothing could be more irrational.
Nothing could be more utterly groundless than any inference from
the orderly course of nature that tliere can be no providential agency
therein. " For when men find themselves necessitated to confess
£iu Author of nature, or that God is the natural Governor of the
world, they must not deny this again, because his government is
uniform ; they must not deny that he does all things at all, because
he does them constantly ; because the effects of his acts are perma-
nent, whether his acting be so or not ; though there is no reason to
think it is not."'' We may add the noble words of Hooker, as re-
plete with the same ideas: "Now, if nature should intermit her
course, and leave altogether, though it were but for a while, the
observation of her own laws — if those principal and mother ele-
ments, whereof all things in this lower world are made, should lose
the qualities whicli they now have — if the frame of that heavenly
arch erected over our heads should loose and dissolve itself — if
celestial spheres should forget their wonted motions, and, by irreg-
ular volubility, turn themselves any way as it might happen — if the
prince of the lights of heaven, which now as a giant doth run his
unwearied course, should, as it Avere, through a languishing faint-
ness, begin to stand still and rest himself — if the moon should wan-
der from her beaten way, the times and seasons blend themselves
by disorder and confused mixture, the winds breathe out their last
gasp, the clouds yield no rain, the earth be defeated of heavenly
influence, the fruits of the earth pine away as children at the
withered breast of tlieir mother, no longer able to yield them re-
lief— what would become of man himself, whom these things do
now all serve ? " ' All such dissolutions in the physical system
' Janet : Final Causes, p. 159.
^Butler: Analoijy, i)art i, chap. ii.
»Hoolier: Works (Oxford ed., 1793), vol. i, pp. 204, 205.
PROVIDENCE IN THE PHYSICAL SPHERE. 325
would be utterly indifferent but for the interest of sentient and
rational existences ; and God, who constituted that system for the
sake of such existences as its finality, ever maintains its uniformi-
ties in their interest. This is the work of his providence in the
conservation of the orderly forms of matter.
III. Pkovidence IN" Animate Nature.
1. Reality and Mystery of Life. — In passing from the lifeless to
the living we reach a higher order of existence. From the highest
chemical and crystalline forms of matter there is still a high ascent
to the lowest forms of life. In the living organism there is a new
element or force, and one far higher than any force of nature pre-
viously operative in the physical history of the world. Life is at
once a reality and a mystery. The mystery cannot conceal the
reality, nor the reality unfold the mystery.
Whatever be the nature of life, it is too subtle for any empirical
cognition. Neither the scalpel nor the microscope can ^^ empirical
reach it. Yet it is not on this account any less a real- cognition op
ity. It is a reality for our reason, just as other forces
which, however manifest in their effects, never reveal themselves
to any sense-j)erception. Gravitation, cohesion, chemical affinity,
magnetism are such hidden forces. There can, however, be no
question respecting their reality. They are every-where operative
in nature, and the aggregate of effects ever resulting from their
agency allows no such question. So the vast aggregate of vital phe-
nomena, so manifold and marvelous in form, can allow no question
respecting the reality of life. As by an imperative law of thought
we require a force of cohesion for the compacting of solid bodies, a
force of chemical affinity for the compounding of discrete elements
into concrete forms, and a force of gravitation for the orderly ruling
of the heavens, so do we require a vital principle or force for the
many facts ever appearing in the sphere of animate nature. This
requirement gives us the reality of life.
The reality of a vital element or force is not the explanation of
its nature. The mystery remains. This fact, however, ^ll force a
is not peculiar to life, but is common to all the forces >'ystery.
of nature. No one pretends to any explanation of the inner nature
of either gravitation, or cohesive attraction, or chemical affinity,
or magnetism. " Astronomers consider gravitation the unknown
cause of the movement of the stars ; I consider life as the unknown
cause of the phenomena which are characteristic of organized beings.
It may be that both gravitation and life, as well as the other gen-
eral forces are merely as x, of which the equation has not yet been
326 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
discovered."' In all these cases, however, the mystery is still the
nature of the cause, not its reality.
2. Providence in the Sphere of Life. — As the cosmos itself, so
life must take its place under the law of dependence. Neither
its spontaneous origin nor its self-sufficiency for the continued facts
of vital phenomena is in any sense an implication of its reality.
For the existence of life and the realm of its activities, reason
requires the interposition of a divine agency. Spontaneous genera-
tion has often been asserted, not, however, as a fact proved, but as
the implication and requirement of a purely naturalistic theory of
evolution. The absence of all proof of such an origin of life is ad-
mitted. There is still for mere science the impassable gulf between
the lifeless and the living. God who said, '' Let there be light,"
must also have said, ''Let there be life." Only in such a divine
fiat could life have its origin.
Even such an origin of life does not give us any insight into its
nature ; though it does give us the idea of a living or-
NO SELF-SUF- J to G O
KiciENCY OF ganism, even if in its germinal incipiency. AYe can
^"'''" have no idea of life apart from an organism. It is the
sense of Scripture that the beginning of life was in organic forms.
It is equally the sense of Scripture that life was to be perpetuated
through a law of propagation.'' Such is the divine law for the realm
of life. But it does not mean that life itself as thus initiated should
be sufficient for all the future of this realm. We should rather find
in the facts the proof of a divine agency than the intrinsic suffi-
ciency of life itself for such a marvelous outcome. This view is
fully warranted by the wonderful complexities and correlations of
part with part in the living organism. It is not thinkable that life
itself, without any higher directive agency, could weave the ele-
ments of matter into such marvelous forms. There miist be a
divine providence in the realm of life.
3. The Vieio of Scripture. — It is the clear sense of Scripture that
God is the Author of all orderly forms of existence, and not only by
an original creative act, but by a perpetual providential agency
through which such forms are perpetuated. It is also the sense
of Scripture that there is a providence of God over living orders
of existence and operative for their preservation. The living
creatures of the sea wait upon God for their meat, and receive
it in due season. Their life is in his hand, and they live or die
according to his pleasure. He sends forth his Spirit, and life in
manifold forms is created, and the face of the earth renewed.*
' Quatrefages : The Human Species, y>. 7.
« Gen. i, 11, 22, 28. "Psa. civ, 27-30.
PROVIDENCE IN ANIMATE NATURE. 327
" The eyes of all wait upon thee ; and thou givest them their meat
in due season. Thou openest thine hand, and satisfiest the desire
of every living thing."' " He givetli to the beast his food, and to
the young ravens which cry." ^ " Behold the fowls of the air : for
they sow not, neither do they reap, nor gather into barns ; yet your
heavenly Father feedeth them."' The same doctrine of a divine
providence in the realm of life, especially in the sphere of sentient
existences, is given by Paul in his great words to the men of Athens.
God is the Creator of all living orders, and gives to all life, and
breath, and all things. Men are his oifspring, and in him live, and
move, and have their being. ^
IV. Providence in the Realm of Mind.
1. Reality of Poiver in Mind. — Any proper interpretation of
providence over mind must keep in view the qualities which differ-
entiate it from all lower orders of existence. In his present con-
stitution man partakes of much in common with the lower orders.
So far he may be the subject of a common providence with them.
With the powers of a personal agency, he is placed in relation to
higher laws of government. Nature without spontaneity is sub-
ject only to a law of force. This is true of the entire physical
realm. With sensibility and instinct, as in the animal orders, there
is spontaneity, but no law of freedom. For such the method of
providence must be according to their nature. There are powers
in man which distinguish him, not only from mere physical nat-
ure, but from all other living orders. With many, matter in itself
is utterly forceless. With not a few, animals are mere automata.
As such they could possess no power of spontaneity, and would in
this respect be reduced to a level with mere matter. Man cannot
be so reduced. Spontaneity cannot be denied him. The proof of
such power is given in every man's consciousness, and in every
instance of free voluntary action. There is not only the power of
voluntary action, such as an animal may put forth, but the power
of rational action. Such action must be from rational motive, and
in freedom. So different is man from all the lower forms of exist-
ence as a subject of providence and law. The rational inference is
that the mode of providence in his government must be widely dif-
ferent from that in the government of the lower orders.
2. Profound Truth of Personal Agency. — The significance of the
power in man for the question of providence requires further state-
ment. Analysis of the mind gives us the pov.^ers of a personal agency,
rational, moral, and religious. There is the freedom of action in
1 Psa. cxlv, 15, 16. •-• Psa. cxlvii, 9. ^ Matt, ri, 36. ■* Acts xvii, 32-28.
328 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
obedience to the laws of liis personal constitution, or against tliem.
In the secular sphere he is capable of a rational life with respect
to present interests and duties. He is thus largely responsible for his
present estate. It is better for him to be thus responsible, even with
the contingencies of secular evil, than to be the subject of necessity.
Man has still a higher nature, and the powers of higher action.
Conscience and moral reason, the sense of God and religious duty
belong to his personal constitution. As so constituted he is properly
a subiect of moral law, and to be governed by moral
MORAL LAW •> ' i ii T
FOR PKRsoNAL motivcs. Hc cannot else be governed at all according
AGENCY. ^^ Yiis moral and religious nature. He can be so gov-
erned only in freedom. This is significant for the mode of his
jDrovidential government. He cannot be subject to any such de-
termining law as rules in physical nature, or even in the animal
orders. He must be left in freedom, even with the contingency of
moral evil. The proof that he is so left is in all the history of the
race.' Man, in common with all other finite existences, is ever in
DEPENDENT, a statc of depcndencc. *' But this natural dependence
YET FREE. upou thc diviuc omnipotence is only the groundwork
of a moral and religious dependence, which allows ample room for
the exercise of self-determination. In the moral order of the world
God's power does not avail itself merely as natural omnipotence —
as the all-generating, world -creating, and world-sustaining will —
but as a commanding and reminding will, speaking to us 'at sun-
dry times, and in diverse manners,' by the law and the prophets
within us as well as without; and likewise as the permissive will
{voluntas j^ci-missiva), which permits even ' darkness ' to have its
hour and its power." Mewed then in the light of the holy law of
God, the course of this world is not only a working together with
God, but a working against hirat also; and the words of Scripture
are realized, 'man's thoughts are not God's thoughts, neither are
man's ways God's ways •,'^ ' the peoi)le imagine a vain thing ; ' the
truth is held 'in unrighteousness;' the spirits of time and the
powers of the darkness of this world oppose God and the kingdom
of his holiness." It is only a false optimism which regards the
actual as in and for itself necessary." ^
3. Provide7ice over Free Personalities. — With the reality of free-
dom, there is still an ample sphere for the providence of God over
man. Only, in the moral sphere the agency of providence must
' Butler : Analogy, part i, chaps, ii-v.
' Luke xxii, 53. ^ Isa. Iv, 8.
*P8a. ii, 1-3 ; Rom. i, 18 ; Eph, vi, 12.
'Martensen: Christian Dogmatics, p. 216.
PKOVIDENCE IN THE REALM OF MIND. 329
accord with this freedom. That it does so accord is a truth pre-
viously set forth as manifest in all the history of the race. If such
is not the truth, the evil deeds of men, as really as the good, must
result from a determining divine agency. A theory of providence
which must either render moral action impossible or make God the
determining agent in all evil can have no place in a true theology.
In the constitution of our moral and religious nature there are
spontaneous activities which wcirn us from the evil and
prompt us to the practice of the good. There is the In'^^cord
sense of God and duty, the sense of spiritual need, ^'"h free-
spontaneous outgoings of the soul for the grace and
blessing of the heavenly Father. In many ways God may address
himself to such feelings and quicken them into a higher state of
practical force. He may do this through events of his providence,
through the words of godly men, through the clearer manifesta-
tion of religious truth, or by an immediate a?jency of the Spirit
within the religious consciousness. The mind may be thus enlight-
ened, the moral and religious nature quickened and strengthened,
the deep sense of sin awakened, the freeness and blessedness of
the divine favor made manifest. In such ways, as in many others,
God may deal with men in the ministries of his providence. Re-
garded as in their moral and religious nature, such are sjiecially the
offices of his providence over them. Therein is the chief sphere
of his providence in dealing v/ith men. Plainly, such offices are in
full accord with our freedom.
4. Tlie Sense of Scripture. — We need no large collection of texts,
nor any elaborate and i^rofound exegesis, to find in the Scriptures
a sense of providence in accord with the law previously stated.
There is still a j^rovidence over man determinative of many things
in his life quite irrespective of his own agency. Yet even in his
secular life he is mostly treated as a personal agent, at j,^., free and
once rational, responsible, and free. The many prom- RESPONsrBLE.
ises of secular good, the many threatenings of secular evil have re-
spect to human conduct, and clearly with the sense of freedom and
responsibility therein. Specially is this so within the moral and
religious sj)here. Man begins his life under a law of duty, with
tho sanctions of life and death.' His history proceeds with divine
appeals to his moral and religious nature in favor of a good life and
against an evil one, with the sanction of reward or retribution
according as he is good or evil. Through all the economies of re-
ligion divine providence proceeded in the same manner. Under
the law and the prophets, under the mission of Christ and the
' Gen. ii, 16, 17.
330 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
ministry of his apostles, appeals are made to man as a free and re-
sponsible subject of moral government. The righteousness of the
final rewards of this life is grounded in tlio same law. Such facts
belong to the divine providence over men. The}' are all in strict
accordance with our personal agency and freedom. Such are the
facts of providence as they openly take their place in the process of
the divine revelation. There must be the same law for the less
open facts of providence in its usual course.
This truth must be of value in the question of theodicy. If the
OF VALUE FOR ^g^^^y of provideucc must be absolute, even in the
ANYTHKODicY. nioral and religious sphere, there can be no approach
toward a theodicy. All evil, physical and moral, must be directly
placed to the divine account. Man can have no personal or respon-
sible agency in either. For good and evil he is but the passive
subject of an absolute providence. In the light of reason, and
conscience, and Scripture there is no such a providence over man.
V. Formulas of Providential Agexcy.
In the doctrine of providence there is mostly recognized a dis-
tinction between the uniform agency of God in the course of nat-
ure and liis occasional interpositions, with results exceptional to
that uniformity. There is ground for such a distinction, and its
clear expression would be helpful to clearness of doctrine. The
distinction itself is not obsciire for thought; yet its proper formula-
tion is not an easy attainment. There is no one formula in com-
mon use. All are open to criticism. A brief notice of such for-
mulas may help us to a clearer view of the distinction which they are
intended to express, and also to a clearer view of providence itself.
1. An General and Special. — Sometimes the word particular is
used in the place of special, but without distinction of sense.
Neither the primary sense of these terms nor their usual interpre-
tation in this formula marks any distinction between the uniform
agency of providence in the course of nature and its exceptional
interpositions, with results apart from that uniformity. Tlie sense
of providence as general is that it sustains and rules all things; as
special or particular, that it is concerned with all the parts, even
NO RKAi. Dis- ^l^c smallest parts of the whole. There is thus no real
TiNCTioN. distinction between the general and the special, and the
only service of the latter term is to emphasize the comprehensive
sense of the former. Here is an instance of such interpretation:
*' There have been disputes among thinking minds in all ages as
to whether the providence of God is general or particular. Phi-
losophers, so called, have generally taken the former view, and
FORMULAS OF PROVIDENTLiL AGENCY, 331
diviues the latter. There has been a wide difference between the
views of these two parties, but there is no necessary antagonism
between the doctrines themselves. The general providence of God,
properly nnderstood, reaches to the most particular and minute
objects and events; and the particular providence of God becomes
general by its embracing evei'y particular." ' It thus appears that
the most vital question of providence never comes into view under
this formula. That question respects interpositions of God apart
from his agency in the uniformities of nature, and above the course
of nature, and which in special instances prevent the results of that
course, or produce results which it would not reach. This is the
real question of the supernatural in providence and in religion. No
formula of providential agency is adequate which does not bring
this truth into clear view.
2. As Immanent and Transcendent. — This formula is in frequent
use, and, seemingly, growing in favor. " We must distinction of
distinguish between the immanent and the transcendent the terms.
in the operations of the providence of God. We call those of its
workings immanent wherein the divine providence incloses itself
in the laws of this world's progress, and reveals itself in the form of
sustaining power in the moral order of things. We call those of its
operations transcendent wherein the course of history is interrupted,
and the divine will breaks forth in creative or commanding manifesta-
tions.'"' The real and vital distinction between the uniform opera-
tions of providence in the order of nature and its supernatural
interpositions which in special instances depart from that course
is here rather intimated or implied than expressed. Yet this dis-
tinction is the very truth which should be most clearly expressed.
Further, the above statements are open to the inference that as be-
tween an immanent and a transcendent providence God operates in
different modes: in the former by the activities of his nature; in
the latter purely by the enei-gizing of his will. There is no ground
for any such distinction. All the providential agency of God is
purely through his will, and no less so in the maintenance of the
orderly course of nature than in those occasional supernatural inter-
positions which produce results apart from that course.
This distinction between the immanence of God in nature and
his transcendence above nature is one that should be ^ distinction
cautiously used. It is true that so long as his personal- to be cau-
ity stands clearly with his transcendence his immanence '^'"^'''^"^ '**'^''^'
in nature cannot consistently be held in any contradictory sense.
' McCosh : The Divine Government, p. 181.
- Marteasen : Christian Dogmatics, pp. 219, 220.
332 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
But we are not always logical in our thinking. Inconsistency is
ever a liability. With the immanence of God as the only force
operative in nature, we are formally close upon pantheism. Expres-
sions of this force inconsistent with the divine personality are pretty
sure to follow. *'God is not simply the transitive but the imma-
nent cause of the universe. He is in nature, not merely as a reg-
ulative principle impressing laws upon matter, but as a constitutive
princii^le, the ever-present source and ever-ojierating cause of all
its phenomena. . . . Nature is more than matter: it is matter
swayed by the divine power, and organized and animated by the
divine life. . . . The will of God is the one primal force which
streams forth in ever-recurring impulses with an immeasurable
rapidity at every point in space — an incessant pulse-beat of the In-
finite Life."'
Dr. Cocker has not left us in any doubt of his theism; yet many
^ of these expressions arc more consistent with pantlie-
REMARKS ON . J^ . ^
COCKER'S ism. They sj^ring from an extreme and unguarded
^^^^' view of the divine immanence in the processes of nature.
The providential agency of God, in whatever sphere of its opera-
tion, is purely tlirough his personal will. This cannot be expressed
as an organizing and animating divine life in nature. Nor can it
be expressed as a force ever streaming forth at every point in
space, as with ceaseless and infinitely rapid pulsations — an incessant
pulse-beat of the Infinite Life. God is not operative in his prov-
idence as a nature, but only as a person. He is in no sense a
natura naturans. It follows that the providential agency of God
is as purely personal and supernatural in his immanence as in his
transcendence. Nor does this formula properly distinguish between
the uniformity of providence in the course of nature and its excep-
tional variations.
3. As Xatural and Supernatural.. — Others may have used this
formula, though we do not remember aily instance. On first view,
it must seem highly objectionable ; and the more so if, as main-
tained, the agency of providence is as verily supernatural in the
uniformities of nature as in its exceptional variations from such
uniformity.
With Bishop Butler's sense of natural, such objection. is obviated
THE SENSE OF ^^^^^ ^'^^ formula approved. ''But the only distinct
.NATURAL. meaning of the word is, stated, fixed, or settled ; since
what is natural as much requires and presupposes an intelligent
agent to render it so — that is, to effect it continually, or at stated
times — as what is supernatural or miraculous does to effect it foj
■ Cocker : Theistic Conception of the World, pp. 141, 142.
FORMULAS OF PROVIDENTIAL AGENCY. 333
once." ' In this sense, natural expresses, not the causal force in the
cosmos, but the uniformity of its operation. Physical causality as
the whole account of the cosmos is no implication of the order of
uniformity. Such may be the order of an intelligent, personal cause.
Order itself, for which mere physical causality is inadeciuate, is the
proof of an intelligent cause. This then is the sense of providence
as natural — a providence which operates uniformly, as in the orderly
processes of nature. For the attainment and maintenance of a cos-
mos there must be uniformity of causal agency, and for the personal
as for the physical. Order is the central reality of a system. Any
assumption that personal causality must be capricious is the sheer-
est gratuity. The perfections of the divine personality are the only
sufficient cause and the only guarantee of the uniformities of nature.
There is such a providence of God, in the maintenance of the or-
derly processes of nature, which from its uniformity we call his
natural providence.
But such a providence, because it is personal, may, in given
instances and for sufficient reasons, so vary its agency g^,^g^ ^^ ^
as to prevent the results of its uniform operation, or supernat-
attain results which otherwise would not be reached.
Such interpositions we call a supernatural providence. The real
distinction, however, is one of order, not of agency. In both the
agency is supernatural, and equally in both, as in distinction from
mere physical forces, but in the one it operates with uniformity,
and in the other with occasional and varying interpositions.
4. Illustrations of the Natural and the Supernatural. — We
shall directly point out the difficulty of distinguishing between the
natural and the supernatural modes of providence, as events usually
arise in the history of the world. We turn therefore for illustra-
tions to sacred history. If any object to such instances, they may
be regarded simply as suppositions. They will in this view equally
answer for illustration.
Palestine has its meteorology, the usual phenomena of which are
well known. It has its former and latter seasons of jj, ^he phys-
rain as yearly occurring. These are facts under the '^al realm.
natural providence of God. Then under his ordering there is a
drought and a famine for three years and six months; and then in
answer to prayer there is, out of season and coming suddenly, a
mighty rain. These are facts of a supernatural providence. God has
so interposed within the laws of nature or the order of his natural
providence as to achieve these supernatural results. Under a
natural providence sun and moon run their appointed course, and
' Analogy, part i, chap. i.
334 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
give lis the orderly measures of day and night. But God so inter-
poses in the working of his natural providence that the sun stands
ptill in Gibeon and the moon is stayed in the valley of Ajalon; and
thus arise the facts of a supernatural providence. For the illus-
tration we need not assume a literal standing still of either sun or
moon. A phenomenal staying Avill answer as well for the Scripture
account. The limited localization of the facts requires a purely
phenomenal mode. As such they were easily within the power of
God^ and were the product of his supernatural providence.
The realm of mind is specially, and chiefly, the sphere of a super-
iN THK KEALM uatural providence. The human mind possesses the
OK MIND. powers of personal agency under a law of freedom.
God is the author of its powers, with the laws of their action.
These laws, together with the providential allotments of life, have
much to do with our action, even under a law of freedom. We
must therefore be the subjects of a natural providence. Often there
are in human life the facts of a supernatural providence. Ahas-
uerus comes to the throne of Persia. His administration proceeds
according to the laws of the kingdom. His daily lif6 is employed
in the exercise of the powers with which he is endowed. So far it
proceeds in the order of a natural providence. But on a certain night
the king is strangely sleepless and restless. A divine influence has
touched the sources of thought and feeling. His mind is put upon
a process of reflection which it would not have reached in its own
working. In this new mood he calls for a reading of the chronicles
of the court. Thus in a crisis of profound interest the king
discovers the hidden wickedness of Haman — which leads to his
speedy and merited destruction, and to the deliverance of the Jews
whose utter ruin he had so craftily and cruelly plotted. ' Here are
the facts of a supernatural providence. In his missionary tour
St. Paul comes to Mysia, intending to go hence into Bithynia. He
is proceeding upon a plan formed in his own judgment. So far he
is acting under a natural providence. Here his plan is changed.
Through an impression of the divine Spirit he goes, not into
Bithynia, but into Macedonia." Here again are the facts of a
supernatural providence.
5. The Mode of Providence often Hidden. — The events of a super-
natural providence are as really supernatural as the
SUP ERN AT- ^ J r
URAL KVKNTs mlracles of Scripture. Miracles, however, have a dis-
AND MIRACLES, ^j^^^ ^^^^ ^^ ^^^ crcdcutials of God's messengers,
and therefore must have an open manifestation. Providential
events have no such office, and therefore need no such manifesta-
' Esth. vi, vii. « Acts xvi, 7-10.
FOIDIULAS OF PROVIDENTIAL AGENCY. 335
tion. They are none the less supernatural on that account. Any-
divine interposition which modifies the working of a natural force,
in however slight a measure, is as truly supernatural as all the
miracles of Moses in Egypt. Any divine influence which induces
new movements of thought and feeling, however unconsciously to
the mind itself, is as really supernatural as the inspiration of Isaiah
and Paul, as the mission of the Spirit at the Pentecost. But as
such providence has no office requiring an open manifestation
it is rarely self-identifying.
The two modes of providence work in the fullest harmony, but
because both are without open manifestation the actual
mode in any given instance is hidden. In marked o1.'^pTo™i-
cases, even in great catastrophes, it is not in human pknce mani-
wisdom to know whether they arise from a natural or a
supernatural providence. For illustration we recall an event
already more than thirty years past, but one still living in the
memory of such as then received its fuller impression. The Arctic,
freighted with much precious life, sailed from Liverpool for New
York. Onward she moved, day after day, until she reached the
Banks of Newfound land. Meantime a French ship sailed from a
Canadian port, on a course which brought her to the same Banks,
and upon a line crossing the path of the Arxtic. There was a col-
lision, and the Arctic quickly perished. It was a fearful catas-
trophe. Whether this was a natural or a suj)ernatural providence
only God could know. If we assume the former, then how easy for
the interposition of the latter ! A few seconds earlier or later sail-
ing ; a very slight change of speed ; the turning of a pilot- wheel,
even to a spoke or two, half an hour before — on any such change
in the case of either ship they would have safely cleared each
other. How easy for God to effect such a change through any rul-
ing mind in the management of either ! Or, if we assume a super-
natural providence in this memorable event, the means were just as
ready to the divine hand for its inducement as for its prevention.
On either view we must recognize a divine providence in such an
event. Whether a natural or a supernatural providence, the heart
of God was with the fated Arctic in every league and knot of her
voyage. This is sure to our faith, however dark the event to our
reason. From our low level we look up as into an investing fog,
such as covered the scene of this fatal collision. God is in the
light, and for him all events are in the light, and he looks down
upon them with the eye of his own wisdom and love. We know
that his eye marks the falling sparrow. N"or should we question
that with an infinitely deeper regard he beheld this fearful event.
3S0 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
As the mode of providence is so hidden from our view, we should
THE PROPKR '^"^ hiistily assume a supernatural interposition in
iNFEUENCK. briugiug about every event wliich specially concerns
the Interests of men. There is no warrant for such an assumption.
On the other hand, we are assured that the divine providence, in
one mode or another, is jn-esent in all such events. We are ever
in the view of God, and under his watchful care.
VI. Truth of a Superkatukal Providence.
1. A TrutJi of Theism. — In a true sense of theism the causal
ground of finite existences is a personal being, with the essential
attributes of personality. As a personal being, his agency must
ever be under a law of freedom. Therefore it must not be fet-
tered with tlie laws of either materialism or pantheism. Both sys-
tems are utterly fatalistic. Of course there can be no freedom
under either. From the beginning, and through all its process,
the course of nature must be absolutely determined, and by the
blindest necessity. The order of nature miist be natural in the
lowest sense of materialism or pantheism. There can be no varia-
tion from such absolute determinism. Consistently with such
principles, the supernatural is utterly denied. Agnosticism is
equally exclusive of freedom, as every system must be which has
no place for the divine personality. Theism is the opposite extreme
to such systems. God is a personal being, with the
FREEDOM OK '' ^ i
THE DivixE freedom of personal agency. Such truths are central
AfiENCY. ^^ theism, and to surrender them is to surrender all
that is most vital in the doctrine. It is not for a personal God to
fetter himself with a chain of absolute sequence in the processes of
nature. He is free to modify these processes, and in the interest
of sentient and rational existences must modify them in exceptional
cases. Without a supernatural providence we sink into the bleak-
ness of deism, and might as well sink into materialism or panthe-
ism. Theism is supernaturalism. If there is a personal God there
is a supernatural providence.
2. A Truth of Moral Oovernment. — There is a moral government
over man. The moral consciousness of the race affirms its truth.
There is in this consciousness a sense of God, of duty, of responsi-
bility. For the consciousness of the race God is a supernatural be-
ing; one who is concerned with human affairs, and in whose regards
men have a profound interest. With all the crudities of polytheism,
the elements of such convictions still abide. Duty, however neg-
lected, is yet confessed to be paramount. Eesponsibility, however
forgotten or resisted in the interest of present appetence and pleasure.
TRUTH OF A SUPERNATURAL PROVIDENCE. 337
still asserts itself and constrains the confession of its importance.
With these convictions there is consistently the sense of a supernat-
ural providence. If they are groundless, the deepest and most imper-
ative consciousness of the race is a delusion. If they are grounded
in truth, as we must rationally think them, there must be a moral
government, and therefore a supernatural providence. Without
such a providence all that is real in such a government falls away.
On the ground of theism there must be a moral government.
With the Christian conception of God there is, and
•■■ , ' PROVIDENCE
there must be, such a government; and with the truth in moral
of a moral government there must be a supernatural «"'^^i^^*'*=^"^-
providence. It is not to be thought that God, as our moral ruler,
would leave us wholly to the guidance of conscience and experi-
ence. If we should except the physical realm from all supernat-
ural interpositions, we cannot rationally close the moral against
such agency. A supernatural providence is the requirement and
complement of a moral government.
3. A Trutli of the Divine Fatlierliood. — The religious conscious-
ness of the race longs for something more than a blind force, even
though it were omnipotent, back of finite and dependent exist-
ences. The profoundest reason imperatively requires something
more. Both require personality in the causal ground of such ex-
istences. The common religious consciousness, with the deep and
abiding sense of dependence and need, requires sympathy and love
lA the Creator and Lord of all. Nothing less can satisfy it, or give
assurance of needed help in the exigencies of life. The assurance
of sympathy and love is reached in the idea of the divine Father-
hood. The light of reason leads up to this idea. The doctrine of
Paul, as delivered to the men of Athens, cannot mean less. Eev-
elation, ojDening with the more special view of the joower of God,
advances to the idea of his sympathy and love, and on to that of
his Fatherhood. The divine Son sets this truth in the clearest,
divinest light. He came to show us the Father. His mission was
marvelously fulfilled. He has revealed the Father in the richness
of his grace and the pathos of his love. The prayer of humanity
may now begin with "' Our Father."
We found it to be against all rational thinking that God as moral
ruler over men should leave them, with their profound obligation and
responsibility, wholly to the guidance of conscience and experience.
How much less could the heavenly Father so leave his dependent
and needy children! He must often interpose by an immediate
agency for their good. The truth of the divine Fatherhood is the
truth of a supernatural providence.
23
338 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
4. A Clear Truili of the Scriptures. — As we previously pointed
out, the agency of God in the uniformities of nature is in itself, and
in distinction from any mere natural force, as strictly supernatural
as in those special interpositions which modify the course of nat-
ure and constitute what w^e distinctively call a supernatural provi-
dence. The Scriptures are replete with both ideas. However, we
are here specially concerned with the latter.
There are many facts of Scripture which can neither be reduced
ILLUSTRATIVE ^0 thc uuiformlty of nature nor accounted for by any
FACTS. known or unknown law of nature. Any such interpre-
tation is false to the truth and life of the facts. In the history of
creation, in the life of Enoch, in the call of Abraham, in the segre-
gation and history of the Hebrews, in the ministry of Moses, in the
inspiration of prophets, there were interpositions of the divine
agency apart from the order of nature, and results above any mere
law of nature. There is like truth respecting many facts of the
New Testament. In the birth and life of our Lord, in his lessons
of truth and miracles of power and grace, in the ministry of his
apostles, in the new spiritual life through the grace of the Gospel
and the power of the Spirit, there are again the interpositions of a
distinctively supernatural agency of God. Theology finds in the
power of God the sufficient cause of such facts, and in his wisdom
and grace their sufficient reason. Tlicre is no law of thought
which requires more; certainly none which demands either their
subjection to natural law or the denial of their reality. Theology
has no issue with science respecting the reign of law in the realm
of nature; but regards the demands of science, that the spiritual
realm, if there be such, shall be subject to the same law, as the
height of arrogance. Any attempted elimination of the supernat-
ural from the Scriptures in the interest of theology is at once a
perversion of the truth and a cowardly surrender to the adversary.
Theism is supernaturalism. Revelation is supernaturalism. Christ
himself is supernatural. Every true spiritual life is supernatural.
We shall hold fast the supernatural in the interest of theology and
religion.
It is the clear sense of Scripture that the divine agency in its
supernatural interpositions reaches beyond the dis-
spmrruALAND tinctively spiritual realm into the natural. These in-
N A T r K A L stances, however, are neither so frequent nor so radical
as to hinder the interests of science or unsettle the laws
of our secular life. Still there arc real instances of a supernatural
agency wdthin the lower sphere in the interest of the higher; within
the lifeless in the interest of the living; within the natural in the
TRUTH OF A SUPERNATURAL PROVIDENCE. 339
interest of the spiritual. It is a rational law, and one ever ob-
servable in the process of nature, that the lower may be used in
the service of the higher. Thus the divine agency is supernatu-
rally operative within the lower forms of existence in the service of
the higher. There is no true interpretation of the Scriptures with-
out the truth of the supernatural.
5. Providence the Privilege of Prayer. — Were there no provi-
dence with a supernatural agency there could be no place for prayer.
With the reality of such a providence, prayer is a common privi-
lege, and the means of blessings not otherwise attainable. Hence
objections to the efficacy of prayer are mostly the same as those
urged against a supernatural providence, and so far require no
separate review. They will be considered in the proper place.
However, this may be said now, that all the proofs of a supernat-
ural providence go to the refutation of these objections. The ref-
utation is already quite sufficient.
Prayer is the supplication of the soul, offered up to God for his
blessing. The forms of need may be many, and the
answers may vary accordingly, but still with a blessing.
The presuppositions of prayer are the personality and providence
of God, his power over nature and mind, his interested watch-care
over us, his kindly regard for our good, his gracious readiness to
help us. The impulse to prayer arises from a sense of dependence
and need. Beyond this, as the soul enters into the truer religious
life prayer is imbued with the spirit of worship, is full of praise
and love. There is the grateful sense of blessings received in an-
swer to prayer. Hence the deeper ideas of prayer are the same in
the thanksgiving as in the supplication.
The instinct for prayer is a part of our religious nature. We have
a religious nature, and one as real and ineradicable as
, ... . mi • • AN IMPULSE OF
any other intrinsic quality. This is rarely questioned, ourrkligious
Thinkers who deny all supernatural ism in religion ^^'^^^*^-
openly confess this reality.' The logic of religious facts constrains
this confession. The time when unbelief would banish all religion
is forever past. Conscience and moral reason, the sense of God and
duty, of dependence and need, are confessedly characteristic facts
of our nature. With these facts, there is the instinctive impulse
to prayer. This impulse must be active in the deeper exigencies
of experience. The fact has often been exemplified, even with such
as usually deny all religious faith. In the hour of painful suspense,
in the presence of calamity, no unbelief can repress this impulse.
' Spencer : First Principles, pp. 13-15 ; Tyndall : Preface to Belfast Address,
seventh edition.
;U0 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
The sense of Scripture on the question of prayer is very full and
clear.' Prayer is a common duty and privilege." Prayer
scnirrrKE o.\ should be offered for national blessings.^ Intercessory
PRAYKK. prayer, prayer of one for another, is a requirement of
the Scriptures/ Our prayer should be with persistence." The
help of the Spirit in our prayers is graciously promised." There are
many instances of timely and gracious answer to prayer. The
blessings for which we may pray, and which are in the promised
answer, are specially of a sj^iritual nature, but are far from being
exclusively such. Secular blessings are included with the spiritual.
God, who commands our prayer and promises the answer, is sov-
ereign in the natural as in the spiritual realm. Our interests lie in
both, though chiefly in the latter. Yet profound exigencies arise
in the former. Both alike are known to our heavenly Father, who
careth for us in all our wants. Prayer for temporal blessings has a
divine warrant in the prayer of our Lord : " Give us this day our
daily bread."
A few words may properly be added for the sake of the truth, and
as a caution against fanaticism. Two facts are worthy
CAUTION ,
AGAINST of special notice. One is that the Jewish theocracy
FANATICISM. specially abounded in secular blessings. So far the
truth holds, however false the view which denies to that economy
all outlook beyond the present life. There were rich promises of
such blessings, and these promises were often fulfilled in answer to
prayer. We, however, are not warranted in the common expecta-
tion of answers so full and so openly supernatural under an econ-
omy so distinctly spiritual as the Christian in its blessings. The
other fact is that the initial period of Christianity was specially
supernatural, miraculous even, and that within the natural realm.
"What thus belonged distinctively to that period can have only a
qualified application in subsequent ages. For instance, we are not
warranted to expect the healing of the sick in a manner so openly
supernatural as in tliat initial period. Nor have we reason to expect
instant or even speedy release from bodily ills or other forms of
trouble simply in answer to prayer. Certainly there should be limit to
such expectation. Submission to the will of God must always qualify
our faith in praying for such blessings. There is in the Scriptures
' Paley : Moral Philosophy, book v, chap. iii.
' Matt, vii, 7, 11 ; Luke xxi, 36 ; Eom. xii, 12 ; Phil, iv, 6 ; 1 Thess. v, 17 ;
1 Tim. ii, 8.
' Psa. cxxii, 6 ; 1 Tim. ii, 1-3.
*Exo(I. xxxii, 11 ; Acts xii, 5 ; Rom. i, 9 ; xv, 30 ; James y, 16.
» Matt, xxvi, 44 ; Luke xviii, 1-8 ; 2 Cor. xii, 8. " Eom, viii, 26, 27.
TRUTH OF A SUPERNATURAL PROVIDENCE. 341
the lesson of patience in suffering. There are promises whose spe-
cial grace is for such as endure suffering. These facts lesson of
do not bar the privilege of prayer for temporal blessings, patience.
but should moderate the expectation of supernatural interpositions
in a manner specially open and manifest. They should teach us the
lesson of humble submission to the divine will. ^'Father, if thou
be willing, remove this cup from me : nevertheless, not my will,
but thine, be done."' How profound is this lesson! With this
spirit, there is still a wide place for prayer in the seasons of tem-
poral affliction. God may answer in our deliverance, or in the mit-
igation of our affliction. Or he may answer us as he answered Paul
respecting the thorn in the flesh.'' Our prayer shall not be in vain.
6. Review of Leading Objections. — A supernatural providence and
the efficacy of prayer are so linked in principle that the same ob-
jections are common to both. Any distinction is so slight that it
may be omitted in the present review. Certain things are alleged
as the disproof of such a providence.
The divine perfections are assumed to be the ground of such an
objection. We require some detail in order to a proper ^he ditine
review of this objection. There are indeed several ob- perfections.
jections on the ground of these perfections, as severally viewed.
One objection is based on the divine immutability. The idea of
a supernatural providence, with answers to prayer, is
the idea of a temporal agency of God above the order of
nature. The objection is that such an agency is contradictory to
the divine immutability. There is no issue respecting the truth of
immutability. Is such an agency contradictory to this truth ? An
affirmative answer must reduce our Christian theism to the baldest
deism. Whatever the agency of God in the realms of nature and
mind, it must be exercised through the personal energizing of his
will. If such a personal providence is consistent with immutabil-
ity, so are the definite acts of a supernatural providence. Only a
false sense of immutability can require the same divine action
toward nations and individuals, whatever the changes of moral
conduct in them ; the same toward Christian believers, whatever
the changes of estate with them. A true sense of immutability re-
quires changes of divine action in adjustment to such changes in
men. It seems strange that any one who accepts the Scriptures can
for a moment give place to this objection.
Another objection is based on the divine omniscience. This ob-
jection is made specially against the efficacy of prayer. God fore-
knows all things, knows from eternity the state and need of every
' Luke xxii, 42. 2 o, Cor. xii. 7-9.
342 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
soul. Hence prayer is not necessary, nor can it have any influence
upon the divine mind. These inferences are not war-
ranted. If it were the office of prayer to give informa-
tion of our wants, it is surely needless, and must be useless. Prayer
has no such office. It is required as the proper religious movement
of a soul in its dependence and need, and thus becomes the means
of God's blessing. The soul is doubly blest through such a condi-
tion of the divine blessing. This will further appear.
Again, objection to the need and efficacy of prayer is urged
WISDOM AND oil the ground of the wisdom and goodness of God.
GOODNESS. j^g ig -^igg ay,(j good, and, therefore, will give what
is good without our asking. We appropriate an answer : " This
objection admits but of one answer, namely, that it may be
agreeable to j)erfect wisdom to grant that to our prayers which it
would not have been agreeable to the same wisdom to have given us
without praying for. ... A favor granted to prayer may be more
apt, on that very account, to produce good effects upon the person
obliged. It may hold in the divine bounty, what experience has
raised into a proverb in the collation of human benefits, that what
is obtained without asking is oftentimes received without gratitude.
It may be consistent with the wisdom of the Deity to withhold his
favors till they be asked for, as an expedient to encourage devotion
in his rational creation, in order thereby to keep up and circulate a
knowledge and sense of their dependency upon him. Prayer has a
natural tendency to amend the petitioner himself ; and thus to
bring him within the rules which the wisdom of the Deity has pre-
scribed to the dispensation of his favors."'
Some attempt an adjustment of providential events to the order
„ „ „ „ „ of nature through the mediation of some hicrher, un-
KOHIOHER O _«'
LAW OF NAT- knowu law. Such events would thus stand in harmony
^^^' with nature, though above it as known to us. There
are weighty objections to this view. Such a higher law is the mer-
est assumption, and therefore useless for the proposed adjustment.
The Aveight of the objection to a supernatural providence is tacitly
conceded, while this hypothetic law brings no answer. No difficulty
is obviated or in the least relieved. Further, how could such a law
of nature be on hand just in the time of need, or wisely minister to
us in the exigencies of our experience, or make timely answer to our
prayers ? Tliere is no answer to such questions. Nor can the tlie-
ory admit any divine application of the law, for this would be the
very supernaturalism which it assumes to displace.
There is another mode in which it is attempted to place the facts
' Paley : Moral Philosophy, Look v, chap. ii.
TRUTH OF A SUPERNATURAL PROVIDENCE. 343
of providence in accord with the order of nature. It is that in the
original constitution of nature God provided for the
° ^ NO ORIGINAL
foreseen wants and prayers of men. Thus the plan of provision of
providence is supernatural, but the mode of its minis- '^^'^'^^^•
tries is purely natural. The theory must hold the reality of natural
forces. Otherwise God is the only force in nature, and the original
provisions of his providence must mean simply a determination of
the modes of his own future agency on the contingency of human
exigencies and prayers. This, however, is the extremest form of
supernaturalism, and therefore out of all consistency with the
theory. With the reality of natural forces, the difficulties of the
theory become insuperable. It is assumed that such forces act
with absolute uniformity. This is the principle on which a super-
natural providence is denied. How, then, can original provision
be made for answers to future prayers through the agency of
such forces ? If human actions were a part of the processes of
nature and subject to the same necessity, such provision might be
made. With the freedom of human action, it is impocsible. The
forces of nature, which in themselves ever act in accord with their
own laws, can never turn aside to meet the exigencies of our experi-
ence or to answer our prayers. This is the work of a supernatural
providence.'
The uniformity of nature is often asserted in objection to a super-
natural providence. So far as this objection is con- uniformity
cerned, such uniformity is simply a question of fact, of nature.
and therefore must be proved before the objection can be valid.
The actual uniformity of nature is no a pfiori truth. The con-
trary is clearly thinkable and possible. The Author of nature can
vary the working of its laws, and may often have reason for such
interjjosition. Hence the question of an unvaried uniformity re-
quires proof, just as any other question of fact. It never has been
proved; nor can it ever be." It might appear that nature, so far as
open to our observation, is uniform; but such observation reaches only
to a small segment of tlie whole. Further, the causal force is never
open to sense-perception, and an event which might seem to arise
from natural forces might in fact arise from the supernatural agency
of God. He could so alter the meteorological conditions in a given
place that a storm should quickly replace the calm. In such a case
there would appear only the signs of natural force, but the affirma-
tion of unvaried uniformity would be false to the deepest truth. It
might be assumed that the forces of nature are always uniform in
' Buchanan : Modern Atheism, pp. 283-301 ; Mozley : On Miracles, lect. vi.
' Jevons : Principles of Science, pp. 149-152, 765.
344 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
their own working, but an unvaried uniformity would not follow.
For such a consequence it would still be necessary to prove that
they are the only forces operative in nature. Of this there is no
proof. The agency of mind is conclusive of the contrary. Mind
is an agency above that order of forces of which uniformity is al-
leged, and often so modifies their working as to vary their results.
So, there may be, and there is, a divine mind operative within the
realm of nature, and in a manner to modify the results of mere
natural force.
This objection advances beyond the previous ground, and denies
ABsoLUTK UNI- ^'^^ posslbiHty of a supernatural providence. The posi-
FoRMiTY. tion would be valid upon the ground of both material-
ism and pantheism ; but neither of these theories is verified, and
so far the 2:)osition is groundless. As previously pointed out, per-
sonal mind acting under a law of freedom is an agency above the
forces of nature, and, in distinction from them, strictly super-
natural.' This is the disproof of an absolute naturalism. The
only ground of such a naturalism is atheism; but atheism is not
proved. If there be a personal God, a supernatural providence is
surely possible. So plain a truth must be clear to all minds with
sufficient intelligence to understand the proposition. John Stuart
Mill deserved no praise, though he has been praiced, for saying that
if there be a personal God a miracle is possible. Of course it is;
and the denial of so plain a truth would betoken the most willful
blindness. The possibility of a miracle is the possibility of a super-
natural providence through a divine variation of the working of
natural forces. The truth of theism is the refutation of this objec-
tion to a supernatural providence.
It is objected to a supernatural providence that it must prove
TioLENCK AND Jtself a dlsordcrly and disruptive agency within the
DISRUPTION. order of nature. "Without a disturbance of nat-
ural law, quite as serious as the stoppage of an eclipse, or the
rolling of the St. Lawrence up the Falls of Niagara, no act of
humiliation, individual or national, could call one shower from
heaven, or deflect toward us a single beam of the sun." *' Assum-
ing the efficacy of free prayer to produce changes in external
nature, it necessarily follows that natural laws are more or less at
the mercy of man's volition, and no conclusion founded on the as-
sumed permanence of those laws would be worthy of confidence.'"
These statements are without logical warrant, and are plausible only
through exaggeration and distortion. The efficacy of prayer does
' Bushnell : Nature and the Supernatural, chap. ii.
*Tyndall : Fragments of Science, pp. 361, 362.
TRUTH OF A SUPERNATURAL PROVIDENCE. 345
not subject the course of nature to the caprice of men. Nor is the
agency of providence subversive of the order of nature. Repre-
sentations more false to the sense of a supernatural providence are
scarcely possible.
A supernatural providence is the agency of God within the realm
of his own works. The laws of nature are his own or-
PROVIDENCE
dination. His supernatural agency is not the disrup- an orderly
tion of nature, not a suspension of the laws of nature, ^^*'^*"'^-
but an interposition which in particular instances produces new
results. By new adjustments and combinations within the sphere
of nature we often modify the results, and without any violence or
disorder. The mechanist so constructs his machinery that its
movement may be adjusted to changing conditions. Its higher
perfection appears in this fact. There is no disorder in the varied
movement. We should not think less of the wisdom of God in
the constitution and government of nature. As a chemist may
vary results by new combinations, or an engineer hasten or slacken
the speed of his train, or a father recast the thought and im-
pulse of his child, so may God interpose the agency of a super-
natural providence within the realm of his own creation and gov-
ernment.
The miracles of Scripture, just as they stand in the several nar-
ratives, involve no disruption of the constitution of illustra-
nature. A mighty rain in answer to the prayer of tions.
Elijah is phenomenally the same as if arising in the regular course
of nature, and just as free from violence or disorder. God could
so change the local conditions of the atmosphere without any
change of the laws of nature. Suppose it true that through his
immediate agency an ax-head rose from the bottom of the Jor-
dan to the surface of the water : the fact involved no violence or
disruption of nature. The law of gravitation was not susj^ended.
The river did not take to the hills. No mountain trembled or
toppled. Iron ores remained quiet in their beds. There was no
reeling of the earth nor falling of the stars. Suppose Elisha had
recovered the ax-head with a grapple: even more gently and orderly
did the agency of God lift it to the surface of the water. The word
of Christ which calms the storm and the sea is no more a disorderly
agency than the oil which quiets the beating waves. Dietetics
remain the same after the miraculous feeding of thousands with a
few loaves and fishes. The common laws of life and death are the
same after the resurrection of Lazarus as before it, yea, the very
same in the instant of his reviviscence. The violence and disrup-
tion of a supernatural providence are the pictu rings of a distorted
346 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
imagination, and no part of the reality. Nature remains the same
for science and all the practical interests of life.
Mind is the chief sphere of a supernatural providence; and there
IX8TANCK IN ^^ hcrc tlic samc absence of disorder. The divine agency
"''''»• acts upon individual minds, and in a manner accordant
with the laws of mental action. Personal agency and moral free-
dom remain complete. It is often the case that one man influences
the thought and feeling of another, and thus indirectly influences
his action. In like manner the teacher influences the pupil, the
parent the child. Here indeed is a law of great potency in human
life; but so far as it operates in accordance with the laws of per-
sonal agency it is free from all violence. By an immediate agency
operative within the mind God can move man's thoughts and feel-
ings in like accordance with his mental constitution and personal
agency, yet so as to induce new forms of action. So orderly is this
agency of providence within the realm of mind.
The facts of a supernatural providence differ from miracles in
FURTHEii iL- their office, and therefore in respect to manifestation.
LUSTRATIONS, jt is thc spccial function of the latter to accredit God's
messengers of truth; therefore they must be open to sense-percep-
tion. The former, while no less supernatural, have no such special
mission, and therefore require no such manifestation. In accord-
ance witli this fact the end of a supernatural providence may often
be reached as readily through the laws of mind as through the
forces of nature. Hence, if it could be determined that events
which have answered great ends were purely natural within the
physical realm, it would not follow that there was no supernatural
agency connected with them. Were the timely storms which de-
stroyed the invincible Armada the immediate work of God ? Whether
such or not, a true faith sees the hand of God in the great event.
There was a simpler and more rational mode of the divine agency
than in the origination of these storms for the hour; and the recog-
nition of such an alternative would have been quite as creditable to
Macaulay as his rather flippant criticism of the popular judgment
in the case.' Just when the Armada should reach the place of its
disaster was not the determination of natural law. In the contin-
gency of human agency its arrival might have been earlier or later.
How easy for the divine agency, acting upon a few minds, or even
upon one controlling mind, to hasten or delay the sailing, so that
the fleet intended for the destruction of England should encounter
the whelming storms which arose purely in the order of nature I
Surely the profound interests contingent upon the result justify the
* History of England, chap. ix.
MAGNITUDE
OF EVIL.
TRUTH OF A SUPERNATURAL PROVIDENCE. 347
faith in such a providence. In a few questions Pope embodies the
objections, whether on philosophic or scientific grounds, to a super-
natural providence.' Shall God reverse his laws for his favorites ?
Shall gravitation cease when one may be passing a mountain just
ready to fall ? The only apparent force of these questions is in the
false assumption that physical nature is the exclusive sphere of a su-
pernatural providence. Then this false assumption is infinitely
exaggerated in the view that such an interposition of providence
must be only through a universal suspension of some law of nature.
We have previously shown the falsity of this view. A man stays a
falling rock till his imperiled friend escapes ; but surely he does not
repeal the law of gravitation. It suffices that, for the time, he
counterworks its force in the impending rock. What man so does
God may do. But, as previously pointed out, there is still a sim-
pler mode of the divine agency in any such case. God can accom-
plish his pleasure through the laws of mind."
The question of so much evil in human life must arise in connec-
tion with several points in the course of theological
discussion. Only a theodicy could fully dispose of its
perplexities. That there is a theodicy we have no doubt; but we
are quite as sure that for us it is an impossible attainment. While
righteousness and judgment are the habitation of God's throne,
clouds and darkness are round about him.^ With these facts be-
fore us, a few words may here suffice.
There is no solution of the question in the principle of Optimism
— that the universe, and therefore the world as a part ^^ solution
of it, is the best that could be created. The principle i-^ optimism.
must be a deduction from the absolute righteousness of God as its
only possible ground. The issue is thus closed against all objec-
tions arising from the magnitude of evil, but only by the assump-
tion of the righteousness against which they are urged. There is
no light for our understanding in such dialectics. For such illu-
mination WO' would require not only the primary truth of an
absolute divine righteousness, but also a comprehension of the pres-
ent world as the best possible. We have no such power; and any
attempt to solve the perplexities of sin and suffering in such a
mode is but a vain endeavor. It is far better not to attempt the
impossible. For our understanding, human ills do perplex the
question of a supernatural providence. The righteousness of God,
clearly manifest despite these ills, is the vindication of his providence
for our faith. This is the utmost attainment for the present life.
^ Essay on Man. ' McCosh : The Divine Government, pp. 183, 183.
^ Psa. xcvii, 2.
348 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
Life is a moral probation. This is the paramount fact of our
LIFE A PROBA- prcscnt existence, the fact in which our deepest inter-
TioN. ests center. The ministries of a supernatural provi-
dence must be in adjustment to such a probation. It does not
follow that freedom from all present evil is a requirement of its
oflHces. Sin is a possibility of such jirobation, and has become act-
ual. This is the source of human ills. With the fact of sin and
its attendant ills, our moral probation still remains, with its pro-
found contingencies. Providence must deal with us in view of all
these facts. Our highest good must be its aim. What shall be its
method? AVe dare not say that its wisest method is in the preven-
tion of all present suffering, or in its reduction to the smallest pos-
sible measure. Our moral interests are paramount; and it may be
the case, and no doubt is, that the wiser method of providence in
their favor is in the permission and use of present suffering. What
seems to us an evil may be a good. We rashly assume a knowledge
of what would be the wisest ministries of providence, and thus in-
volve ourselves in perplexity and doubt. A little child knows not
its own interests, and therefore knows not the wisest parental treat-
ment. No more can we know what measures and ministries of
providence shall best accord with its wisdom.
With the deepest mystery of suffering, what would be gained by
NO GAIN IN the denial of a supernatural providence? The denial
ATHEISM. would not lessen the ills of life, but would deprive us
of the divinest inspiration of trust and patience and hope. God
would no longer be for the soul an assured " refuge and strength,
a very present help in trouble."' From the persuasion of a super-
natural i^rovidence springs the heroism of faith. With this truth,
Paul could say, even in the deepest trouble, and with the pro-
foundest sense of security, " I know whom I have believed; "'■' and
Job could say, " Though he slay me, yet will I trust in him."' If
we read with the Revised Version, "Yet will I wait for him," the
sense appears little changed, especially in view of the context. Such
a faith is the strength of the soul, and the formative power of the
noblest life.
The ills of life, however, are not all in utter darkness. When
punitive they have an explanation in the demerit of sin, and no
ground of complaint remains. Often afflictions have
a disciplinary office, and are ministries of love. We
need their correcting and restraining force, and are the better for
their patient endurance. Thus the chastenings of the heavenly
Father proceed from his love, with the aim of our highest good.
' Psa. xlvi, 1. -^3 Tim. i, 12. 'Job xiii, 15.
TRUTH OF A SUPERNATURAL PROVIDENCE. 349
Though for the present grievous, and not Joyous, they are fruitful
of righteousness.' This whole lesson on the ministry of suffering
is replete with the deepest truth. If such afflictions fail of
their proper results, the fault is our own. We may pervert
them just as we may pervert the most direct blessings of life.
It suffices for the vindication of providence, that they are
wisely and graciously intended as the means of our greatest good.
When rightly endured their fruitage is in blessedness. " Be-
hold, we count them happy which endure. Ye have heard of
the patience of Job, and have seen the end of the Lord; that
the Lord is very pitiful, and of tender mercy. " ^ In the in-
stances of Abraham, and Joseph, and Moses, and Daniel, and
Paul, life is tested in the furnace of affliction, and the gold is only
the purer for the trial. In addition to their own personal good,
how valuable the lesson of their patience and piety! That lesson
has been the inspiration of many a true soul. Nor have all the
passing centuries exhausted its helpful influence. It is still work-
ing for good, and will continue so to work through all the coming
centuries.
For Christian thought the truth of a supernatural providence
stands in the clear light of the cross. This is the s^reat
P , ° LIGHT FOR
fact of such a providence in behalf of the world and christian
the interests of moral government. It is the crown- faith.
ing fact of blessing through suffering; of blessing for the many
through the suffering of the One. It is replete and radiant with
the divine wisdom and love. In it center the divincst moral truths.
There is no murmur upon the lips of Christ, as against a dark and
afflictive providence, that he should so suffer for the good of oth-
ers. In the presence of the cross there should be with us no mur-
murings against the ills of life, no doubt of a good providence over
us, but patience and faith, and the inspiration of the truest, best
life.
' Heb. xii, 5-11. 2jas. V, 11.
General reference. — Sherlock : On Providence ; Young : The Providence of
God Displayed ; Flavel : Divine Conduct, or the Mystery of Providence ; Croly :
Divine Providence; Pilkington : Doctrine of Providence; Proclus : Essay on
Providence; Wood: Works, lects. xlii-xlv ; Hodge: Systematic Theology, vol.
i, part i, chap, xi ; Knapp : Christiayi Theology, sees. 67-73 ; McCosh : The
Divine Government, book ii ; Corner: System of Christian Doctrine, vol. ii,
pp. 44-62 ; Shedd : Dogmatic Theology, Theology, chap, viii ; Van Oosterzee :
Christian Dogmatics, sees, lix-lxiv ; Smith : System of Christian Theology, pp.
103-114 ; Strong : Systematic Theology, pp. 202-220.
PART III.
ANTHROPOLOGY.
ANTHROPOLOGY.
The one term, anthropology, has both a theological and a scien-
tific use. Theological anthropology deals with the facts of man's
moral and religious constitution and history as related to Christian
doctrine, while scientific anthropology deals with his specifical char-
acteristics. However, in the latter case there are wide variations.
With naturalists anthropology means the natural history of the
race. With German philosophers the term is so broadened as to
include psychology, sociology, and ethics, together with anatomy
and physiology.' Hence in works with the common title of an-
thropology there is a great difference in the range of topics. In the
wider range some things are included which belong also to theology.
However, enough difference still remains for the division into a
scientific and a theological anthropology.
It should be noted that this distinction simply differentiates
topics, not methods of treatment. It is not meant that the treat-
ment of scientific anthropology is any more scientific than the
treatment of theological anthropology.
In a philosophy of religion all the facts which concern the moral
and religious constitution and history of man might ^jj^hropo-
properly be called anthropological. This would greatly logical doc-
broaden the term, as we found it broadened in the sci- ''''^'''"'*'^-
entific sphere. In an evangelical theology, however, the view of
anthropology is largely determined by its relation to the mediation
of Christ. Man is thus viewed as in need of redemj)tion and salva-
tion. This need arises from the fact of sin, or the common sinful
state of man. This state is the chief question of doctrinal an-
thropology. It is, in accordance with theological formulation, the
doctrine of sin. But a proper treatment of this doctrine requires a
previous treatment of primitive man, his probation and fall, and
the consequence of that moral lapse to the race. With this ques-
tion of consequence the further question of our relation to the
Adamic probation arises — whether it was such as to involve us in
the guilt and punishment of Adam's sin. There is still a further
' Krauth-Fleming : Vocabulary of the Philosophical Sciences, Anthropology.
24
354 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
question — wliothor the common native depravity, as consequent to
the Adamic fall, has in itself the demerit of sin. We have thus
indicated, in a summary way, the leading questions of anthropology
in a system of Christian doctrine. In their discussion they will
appear in their proper order, and with more exact formulation.
These questions are not simply of speculative interest, or merely
cARniNAL IN incidental to a system of Christian theology, but in-
THEOLOfiY. trinsic and determining. In any system, whether
evangelical or rationalistic, the anthropology and soteriology must
be in scientific accordance. If we start from the side of anthropol-
ogy, our soteriology must follow accordingly. If we proceed in the
reverse order, a like consequence must follow for our anthropology.
If our present state is the same as our primitive state, if there is no
moral lapse of the race, and no common native depravity, there
can be no need of a redemptive mediation in Christ, nor of regen-
eration through the agency of the Holy Spirit. To allege any such
necessity is to assume an original constitution of man in a state
of moral evil and ruin. No theory of Christianity can rationally
admit such an implication. With a moral lapse of the race and a
common native depravit}^, we need the redemptive mediation of
Christ, and the offices of the Holy Spirit in our regeneration and
spiritual life. For the reality of these facts we require the divinity
of the Christ, the personality and divinity of the Holy Spirit.
With these truths we require the truth of the divine Trinity. On
a denial of the primitive lapse and moral ruin of the race, all these
great truths may be dismissed. They can have no proper place in
theology. So intrinsic and determining is the doctrine of anthro-
pology in a system of Christian theology. " Original sin is the
foundation upon which we must build the teaching of Christian
theology. This universal evil is the primary fact, the leading
truth whence the science takes its departure; and it is this which
forms the peculiar distinction of theology from sciences which
work their own advancement by the powers of reason." '
CHAPTER I.
PRELIMINARY QUESTIONS.
The origin of man, the time of his origin, and the unity of the
race are open questions of science, and, with the wide study of an-
thropology, could not fail to be brought into scientific treatment.
These same questions are also related, more or less intimately, to
' Melanchthon.
THE ORIGIN OF MAN. 355
theological anthropology. Instances of divergence in scientific and
doctrinal opinion are not to be thought strange. With the extreme
views of some scientists^ certain points of issue arise, more espe-
cially respecting the origin of man and the time of his origin. On
the side of revelation these questions specially concern the offices
of exegesis and apologetics; yet they are so related to systematic
theology that we cannot pass them without some notice. A sum-
mary treatment will suffice.
I. The Origiist of Man.
1. In Theories of Evolution. — Theories of evolution widely dif-
fer in the account which they give of the origin and progress of
life in its manifold forms. The variations range from a material-
istic ground up to a form held to be consistent with biblical theism.
"With this wide range of theories, and with the marked charac-
teristics of man which differentiate him from all other forms of
organic being, evolutionists specially differ respecting his origin.
"We may notice three views.
First, then, there is the theory which is purely materialistic and
atheistic in its principles. Matter is the only real be- the atheistic
ing, and is eternal. Primordially, it existed in the theory.
condition of a vastly diffused fire-mist. The inception of evolu-
tion was from the nature of matter in such a state. Such was
the beginning. The whole process has been equally naturalistic.
There is no other force than such as in some way belongs to mat-
ter. Man is the product of this force, not immediately in the
order of sequence, but none the less really; for, according to this
doctrine of evolution, all the force ever operative in the universe
existed potentially in the original fire-mist. Such is the origin
of man in this theory. He is the outcome of a long process in
the ascending scale of evolution, but none the less a product of
mere material force. There is such a theory of evolution. Its ad-
vocates are not the many, yet it has its representative names. "We
have no occasion again to controvert the theory.
Another theory admits the interposition of a divine agency, but
only in a very restricted measure. Originally Mr. Dar- ^he theistic
win attributed the inception of living orders to such an theory.
agency. But the primary endowment of one or, at most, a few simple
forms witii life is with him the sum of that agency. There is no di-
vine interposition at any other point. From this inception the whole
process of evolution is purely naturalistic. Man is the outcome of
this process. His origin is the same and one with the lowest forms
of life. There is no provision for any essential distinction of mind.
;3J0 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
In a third view, God was not only operative in the inception of -^
life, but lias continued his agency through the whole process of
evolution. Some regard evolution simply as the method of his
creative work. Hence in the evolution of new sj^ecies mere natural
force is replaced by the divine agency. Special account is made
of this agency in the evolution of man. From this point, however,
opinions may widely diverge. The divergence is into different
<^iews of the nature of man. There may be no profound distinction
between his physical and mental natures. Mind itself may be re-
garded as a product of evolution, and without any essential distinc-
tion from the body. With others there is a profound distinction
between the two; and, while the body is an evolution, the mind is
an immediate creation of God.
2. In the Sense of Sc7'iptu?'e. — We turn to the sacred narratives
of man's creation for the Scripture sense of his origin. The whole
account is given in comparatively few words. " And God said.
Let us make man in our image, after our likeness,"' In these
DIVINE words, with their connection, a few facts are specially
AGENCY IN noteworthy. In the process of this narrative we have
CREATION. ^j^g several phrases, "Let there be; " "Let the earth
bring forth;" "Let the waters bring forth." ° These words sig-
nify the divine energizing in the work of creation. Any interpre-
tation which limits the sense to an agency of nature is utterly false
to the deeper truth. " The earth " and " the waters " mean the
fields of the divine agency rather than any creative agency of their
own. While these forms of expression are entirely consistent with
the use of secondary causes in the method of creation, they never
can be interpreted satisfactorily without the divine agency.
There is a notable change in the form of words respecting the
MAN AN oiiG- cJ'^^^ion of man. He is the last in the successive or-
iNAi, CREA- ders, and the crown of the whole. There is a change
"^^' in the divine procedure; no longer an immediate word
of creative energy, but deliberation, preparatory counsel: "Let us
make man." The truth of the Trinity, implicit in these words,
becomes explicit as we read them in the light of the more perfect
revelation. The grade of man in the scale of creation is marked
with the deepest emphasis: " Let us make man in our image, after
our likeness." All the deep meaning of these words is not for
present inquiry. Their most open sense places man above all other
orders as a spiritual, personal being. We read the same meaning
in the dominion assigned him over all other orders.' He was
created in the likeness of God to this end, and with qualification
• Gen. i, 26. ' Gen. i, 3, 11, 20. ' Gen. i, 26, 28.
THE ORIGIN OF MAN. 357
for this headship. These facts place the origin of man in an imme-
diate divine creation.'
In the second narrative of man's creation we read: "And the
Lord God formed man of the dust of the ground, and the second
breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man narrative,
became a living soul."^ There is no contradiction, not even dis-
crepancy, between these two narratives. The second is more spe-
ciiic respecting a few facts, but in entire consistency with the more
general account. In the second there is a distinction of soul and
body. Even without this second narrative, the same distinction
would have been read into the first. Otherwise, the body rather
than the soul would have been omitted from the meaning, because,
without the latter, in no proper sense could man be the image of
God. The formation of the body from the dust of the ground, or
out of existing material, is also a more specific fact of the second
narrative. With only the first narrative, such would have been the
more rational inference. So consistent are the two respecting this
fact. Again, in the first narrative we learn that God created man
male and female; but only the general fact is stated.^ Then in the
second the specific manner of woman's creation is given." Thus
through and through the two narratives are in full accord. Man
is still so distinct from all other orders that we must assign his
origin to an original creation.
3. Relation of tlie Question to Theologu. — With a purely natu-
ralistic evolution, and inclusive of man as of all lower orders, no
place remains for a theological anthropology or for any form of
theology. Outright materialism is the only ground of such an
evolution; and outright materialism is outright atheism. With
atheism, atheology.
The second theory, which admits a divine agency in the incep-
tion of life, but finds no place for that agency in the whole
process of evolution, not even in the origin of man, leaves no
ground for a doctrinal anthropology as related to other cen-
tral doctrines of Christianity. Man remains thoroughly im-
plicated in the course of nature. Indeed, he is but a part of
nature, down in the dead level of the whole, and without any
essential distinction in himself. The theory pushes God so far
from the course of nature, and so utterly away from man, that for
religion and theology it is practically atheistic. No theory of
evolution which denies an immediate and transcendent agency
' Macdonald : Creation and the Fall, pp. 287-291 ; Laidlaw : Bible Doctrine
of Man, pp. 277-279.
* Gen. ii, 7. •' Gen. i, 27. ' Gen. ii, 21, 23.
358 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
of God in the origin of man can be consistent with Christian
theology.
The third form of evolution, which excepts the mind from the
process of nature and accounts its origin to the tran-
coN'^srsTK'.NT sccndent agency of God, stands in a very different re-
wiTH TiiK- lation to theologv. The evolution of man in his phvs-
OLOGY. . . . . . ^ "
iological constitution, if established as a truth, would
raise new questions of exegesis, but would not unsettle the grounds
of Christian doctrine. Some theologians and expositors, with
thorough loyalty to the Scriptures, hold this view. The position is
that, while the Scriptures account the origin of the human species,
even in its physical constitution, to the divine agency, they leave it
an ojjen question whether tlie method of tliat agency was by a me-
diate or immediate creation. "Whether God formed the body of
primitive man immediately from the ground or mediately through
a long process of genetic derivation does not in itself affect
either his complete constitution as man or his place in Scripture,
as related to theological anthropology.
The modern hyijothesis of evolution should cause no alarm for
THEOLOGY -NOT Christiau thcolog}'. Evolution itself is as yet a mere
IN PERIL. hypothesis, unverified as a theory. A purely natural-
istic evolution is not only unproved, but in the very nature of the
case is unprovable. With the evolution of the human body, the
human mind would still stand apart from the physical process, with
the only account of its origin in the creative agency of God.
There is no urgency for haste in making terms with modern evolu-
tion. It is only an hypothetic structure, without the substance of a
science. With limitless assumption and dogmatism, it lacks the
material for the foundation of a science. There must be long wait-
ing for the superstructure. The evolution of the human race is
wholly without proof, and the sheerest assumption. There is the
broad margin between man and the highest order below him — con-
fessedly too broad for crossing by a single transition in the process
of evolution. All search for connecting links is utterly fruitless.
That broad margin remains without the slightest token of succes-
sive stages in the transition across to man. The Bible account of
his origin in the creative agency of God remains, and will remain,
the only rational account. The grounds of a theological anthro-
pology remain secure.
II. Time of Man's Origin.
The question of the antiquity of man could not fail of prom-
inence in the discussions of modern science. As students of nature
TIME OF MAN'S ORIGIN. 359
trace the marks of change in the spheres of cosmogony, geology,
zoology, archaeology, the question of time must con- interest op
etantly arise. The division of geology into periods ™^ question.
keeps the question ever present in that study. Period will be com-
pared with period in respect to length of duration. A fuller knowl-
edge of nature is possible only with some insight into the measures
of time occupied in the processes of change. This question, so con-
stantly present, could not fail of special interest in its application
to man. Even for the extremest evolutionist his apjDearance must
have an interest above every other event in the course of nature.
Very naturally, therefore, the signs of his presence have been care-
fully traced, and deeply studied in connection with such other facts
as might be helpful toward a proximate measurement of his time in
the natural history of the world.
Scientists are agreed that, of all living orders in the world's his-
tory, man came last. They are equally agreed that his widely dif-
origin is comparatively recent. • But a comparative Peking views.
recency in geological time may be very long ago — so long as to
dwarf the centuries of biblical chronology into mere hours. Such
measurements are made. An issue thus arises, for the thorough
discussion of which only a large volume would answer. We can do
little more than state the question. It may be said here that these
measurements of man's time on earth vary almost infinitely, and
that this fact denies to scientists infallibility on the question.
Not only are they at such variance, but some measure a time in no
serious issue with biblical chronology, on a permissible extension
of its centuries.
1. In the View of Biblical Chronology. — It is well known that
biblical chronology remains, as it ever has been, an ^^ ^^
^•^ , , ' ^ , NO DOCTRINE
open question. Individuals may have been very posi- of biblical
tive respecting the exact years of the great epochal chronology.
events in the world's history, but there is no common concurrence
in such a view. The profound est students of the question find
different measures of time, not varying so widely as between
scientists, yet sufficiently to be of value in the adjustment of the
seeming issue with facts of science. The leading views are well
known and easily stated. The origin of man preceded the advent
of our Lord by 4,004 years, as reckoned by Usher on the ground of
the Hebrew Scriptures; by 5,411 years, as reckoned by Hales on the
ground of the Septuagint Version. Here is a margin of 1,407 years,
which might cover many facts of science respecting the presence
of man in the world, and bring them into harmony with biblical
chronology. The acceptance of this reckoning requires no cunning
360 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
device. While througli the Vulgate Version the shorter period
gained ascendency in the Western Church, in the Eastern the
longer period prevailed. With the whole Church it has been quite
as common; and, while a lower estimate than that of Usher has
rarely been made, a longer reckoning than that of Hales has not
been rare.
The uncertainty of biblical chronology is of special value in its
rNfKUTAixTv adjustment to the reasonable claims of science respect-.
OK TiiK DATA, jjjg ^j^g ^Jjjjq gf man'g origin. That uncertainty is no
recent assumption, no mere device which the exigency of an issue
with science has forced upon biblical chronologists, but has long
been felt and openly expressed. The many different and widely
varying results of the most careful reckoning witness to the un-
certainty of the data upon which that reckoning proceeds. The
tables of genealogy are the chief data in the case, and their aim is
to trace the lines of descent, not to mark the succession of years.
Hence the line of connection is not always traced immediately from
father to son, but often the transition is to a descendant several
generations later — which answers just as well for the ruling pur-
pose, however it may perplex the question of time. '' Thus in
Gen. xlvi, 18, after recording the sons of Ziljia, her grandsons and
her great-grandsons, the writer adds, ' These are the sons of Zilpa,
. . . and these she bare unto Jacob, even sixteen souls.' The same
thing recurs in the case of Bilha, verse 25, ' she bare these unto
Jacob : all the souls were seven,' Compare verses 15, 22. No
one can pretend that the author of this register did not use the
term understandingly of descendants beyond the first generation.
In like manner, according to Matt, i, 11, Josias begat his grandson
Jechonias, and verse 8, Joram begat his great-grandson Ozias.
And in Gen. x, 15-18, Canaan, the grandson of Noah, is said to
have begotten several whole nations, the Jebusite, the Amorite, the
Girgasite, the Hivite, etc. Nothing can be plainer, therefore, than
that, in the usage of the Bible, 'to bear' and ' to beget ' are used in a
wide sense to indicate descent, without restricting this to the im-
mediate offspring." ' It would be easy to give many other instances
of a like presentation of facts. Such facts justify the prevalent
uncertainty respecting biblical chronology. Indeed, the tables
which furnish the chief data for its construction are purely gen-
ealogical, and in no proper sense chronological. With such uncer-
tainty of data, no biblical chronolog} can have either fixed limits
or doctrinal claim. It follows that the usual reckoning may be so
' Green : The Pentateuch Vindicated from the Asjjersions of liishoj) C'olenso,
p. 132.
TDIE OF MAN'S ORIGIN. 361
extended as to meet any reasonable requirement of scientitlc facts
respecting the time of man's origin, without the perversion of any
part of Scripture or the violation of any law of hermeneutics.
Such are the views of theologians thoroughly orthodox in creed and
most loyal to the Scriptures.'
2. Scieniific Claim of a High Antiquity. — While scientists are
agreed that man is the latest of living orders, and com- tiews of sci-
paratively very recent, there is with them a wide range entists.
of opinion respecting the time of his origin. Many are agreed in
assigning him a high antiquity. However, beyond this jwint of
agreement the range is from a comparatively moderate reckoning,
say 100,000 years, up to millions, and even hundreds of millions.
Figures, however, are rarely given, but alleged facts are assumed
to measure vast ages. Lyell thinks he can trace the signs of man's
existence up to the post-pliocene era, and anticipates
the finding of his remains in the pliocene period.*
Only an immense reach of time can carry us back to that period.
Again, he thinks that the facts of geology "point distinctly to the
vast antiquity of paleolithic man." ^ After a review of some of
the evidences of man's antiquity Huxley puts the
question of time thus : " AVhere, then, must we look
for primitive man ? Was the oldest Homo sajjiens pliocene or
miocene, or yet more ancient? " * Without the " yet more ancient,"
he had already gone back into the midst of the tertiary period.
By so much does he transcend Lyell. On the truth of evolution
Huxley is sure that "w.e must extend by long epochs the most lib-
eral estimate that has yet been made of the antiquity of man." Sir
John Lubbock is quite up with Lyell ; indeed, we may say, quite
up with Huxley. The relative facts of geology " im-
, , -i . n LUBBOCK.
press us with a vague and overpowering sense oi an-
tiquity. . . . But it may be doubted whether even geologists yet
realize the great antiquity of our race."° Lubbock believes in
miocene man, but rather as an implication of evolution than f^'om
any discovered sign of his presence in that ancient geologic age. **
Wallace is comparatively very moderate, but reaches out
for a long time. " We can with tolerable certainty affirm
that man must have inhabited the earth a thousand centuries ago,
but we cannot assert that he positively did not exist, or that there
' Hodge : Systematic Theology^ vol. ii, pp. 40, 41 ; Pope : Christian Theology,
vol. i, pp. 319, 434; Strong: Systematic Theology, p. 106.
"^Antiquity of Man, p. 399. "Principles of Geology, vol. ii, p. 570.
■• Man's Place in Nature, p. 184. ' Lubbock : Prehistoric Times, p. 419.
Ubid., p. 423.
302 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
is any good evidence jigainst liis having existed, for a period of ten
thousand centuries."' We have given a few instances. Many
scientists of like views might be added to the list.
3. Review of Alleged Proofs. — The sources of evidence for a high
antiquity of man are well defined, and appear with much uniform-
ity in the fuller treatment of the question. However, the treat-
ment is often partial, when the evidence from only a few sources,
perhaps from only one, is adduced. This is the method of Huxley,
who treats the question simply in view of fossil remains of man,
particularly of fossil skulls.* A summary of the sources of evidence
in a comprehensive treatment is given by Southall,' and also by the
Duke of Argyll.^ These summaries, while varying in words, are
much the same in their facts. The comprehensive discussions of
the question by Sir Charles Lyell ^ and Sir John Lubbock ° are sub-
stantially in the method of these classifications.
We may state the evidences of a high antiquity of man in the
SUMMARY OF followlug ordcr : 1. History, with special reference to
PROOFS. w^Q antiquity of nations. 2. Archseology, including
many forms of fact which show the early presence and agency of
man. .3. Geology, with sj^ecial reference to drift deposits. 4. Lan-
guage— the time necessary for its growth and multiplication into so
many forms. 5. The distinction of races in color and feature. Our
brief review cannot fully adhere to this order.
The evidence from history centers in the proof of an early exist-
ence of separate nations or kingdoms. Contemporary
HISTORY X •/
with the earliest history of Abraham, twenty centuries
before the Christian era, Chaldea and Egypt appear as strong and
flourishing kingdoms. Kings with separate realms are already
numerous, mostly with small dominion, but some perhaj)s, as ap-
peared a little later in the case of Chedorlaomer, king of Elam,
with broad sway. So much may fairly be gathered from the Script-
ures.' The evidence of history and archseology seems conclusive that
in the time of Abraham Egypt was a strong kingdom, with a high
form of civilization. Such a kingdom could not be the growth of
a few years ; and we may add an antecedent history of from five to
seven centuries. Renouf would add many more,** but the number
named will suffice. There were other kingdoms and civilizations,
the Babylonian, Persian, Indian, and Chinese, of about the same
antiquity. They also came into history about the time of Abraham,
' On Natural Selection, p. 303. ■ Man^s Place in Nature, p. 140.
* The Recent Origin of Man, p. 86. •* Primeval Man, pp. 76-78.
' Antiquity of Man. * Py^efiistoric Times.
' Gen. xi-xiv. ^ The Religion of Ancient Egypt, lect. ii.
TIME OF MAN'S ORIGIN. 363
but, with Egypt, required previous centuries of growth. " So far,
then, we have the light of history shining with comparative clear-
ness over a j)eriod of two thousand years before the Christian era.
Beyond that we have a twilight tract of time which may be roughly
estimated at seven hundred years — a period of time lying in the
dawn of history, at the very beginning of which we can dimly see
that there were already kings and princes on the earth."'
It thus appears that history, with its clear implications, carries
the existence of distinct nations back to the time of the results of
flood — as that time is usually reckoned. We have three history.
alternatives : either a narrow limitation of the flood, or a plurality
of human origins, or an extension of our biblical chronology ante-
rior to the call of Abraham. No sufiicient limitation of the flood
is permissible. If consistently with the Scriptures we might in this
mode account for the existence of the distant nations of India and
China, we could not so account for the equally early, rather earlier,
nations in the regions of the Tigris and the Euphrates. These
regions could not have escaped the flood. A plurality of human
origins is contrary to the Scriptures and to the facts of science, and
inconsistent with the deepest truths of Christian theology. The
third alternative may be accej)ted without the slightest hesitation.
There is no fixed chronology of the Scriptures before the time of
Abraham. Hence there is nothing against the addition of all the
time — say two or three thousand years — which the facts of human
history may require.
Many facts adduced in evidence of a high antiquity of man may
be grouped under the heads of archseology and geology, archjsology
In some classifications the two terms represent distinct and geology.
sets of facts. The distinction, however, is but slight, and may be
omitted in our brief discussion. Under these headings we have
several classes of facts, and many particulars of each class — alto-
gether too many for present notice. We may name as classes —
megalithic structures and tumuli ; lake-dwellings ; shell-mounds ;
peat-bogs ; bone-caves ; drift-deposits. The point of the argument
in each is that the remains of man and the products of his agency
appear in conditions which prove his high antiquity.^ This argu-
ment is fully elaborated by the authors named.
We shall give a very brief reply in the words of an eminent sci-
entist. " The calculations of long time based on the gravels of
the Somme, on the cone of the Tiniere, on the peat-bogs of
' Argyll : Primeval Man, p. 95.
' Lubbock : Prehistoric Times ; Lyell : Antiquity of Man ; Jeffries : Natural
History of the Human Races; Quatrefages : The Human Species, pp. 139-153.
364 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
France and Denmark, on certain cavern deposits, have all been
shown to be more or less at fault ; and possibly none of these
reach further back than six or seven thousand years which, accord-
ing to Dr. Andrews," have elapsed since the close of the bowlder-
clay deposits in America. . . . Let us look at a few facts.
CONK OF THE Much usc has been made of tlie ' cone ' or delta of the
TIMBRE. Tinicre, on the eastern side of the Lake of Geneva, as an
illustration of the duration of the modern period. This little stream
has deposited at its month a mass of debris carried down from the
hills. This being cut through by a railway, is found to contain
Koman remains to a depth of four feet, bronze implements to a
depth of ten feet, stone implements to a depth of nineteen feet. The
deposit ceased about three hundred years ago, and, calculating
1,300 to 1,500 years for the Roman period, we should have 7,000
to 10,000 years as the age of the cone. But before the formation
of the present cone another had been formed twelve times as
large. Thus for the two cones together a duration of more than
90,000 j^ears is claimed. It appears, however, that this calculation
has been made irrespective of two essential elements in the question.
No allowance has been made for the fact that the inner layers of
a cone are necessarily smaller than the outer ; nor for the further
fact that the older cone belongs to a distinct time (the pluvial age
already referred to), when the rainfall was much larger, and the
transporting power of the torrent greater in proportion. Making
allowance for these conditions, the age of the newer cone, that
holding human remaiut^, falls between 4,000 and 5,000 years. The
ABBEVILLE pcat-bcd of Abbeville, in the north of France, has grown
PEAT-BED. at the rate of one and a half or two inches in a century.
Being twenty-six feet in thickness, the time occupied iu its growth
must have amounted to 20,000 years ; and yet it is probably newer
than some of the gravels on the same river containing flint imple-
ments. But the composition of the Abbeville peat shows that it is
a forest j^eat, and the erect stems preserved in it prove tliat in the
first instance it must have grown at the rate of about three feet in a
century, and after the destruction of the forest its rate of increase
down to the present time diminished rapidly almost to nothing.
Its age is thus reduced to perhaps less than 4,000 years. In 1865
GRAVELS OK ^ ^^^ ^^ opportuuity to examine the now celebrated
ST. AcnEUL. gravels of St. Acheul, on the Somme, by some supposed
to go back to a very ancient period. With the papers of Prestwick
and otlier able observers in my hand, I could conclude merely that
the undisturbed gravels were older than tlie Roman period, but how
^Transactions, Chicago Academy, 1871.
TIME OF MAN'S ORIGIN. 365
much older only detailed topographical surveys could prove ; and
that taking into account the probabilities of a different level of the
land, a wooded condition of the country, a greater rainfall, and a
glacial filling of the Somme valley with clay and stones subsequently
cut out by running water, the gravels could scarcely be older than
the Abbeville peat. . . . Taylor^ and Andrews" have, however, I
think, subsequently shown that my impressions were correct.
" In like manner, I fail to i:)erceive — and I think all American
geologists acquainted with the prehistoric monuments srxDRY other
of the western continent must agree with me — any evi- facts.
dence of great antiquity in the caves of Belgium and England, the
kitchen-middens of Denmark, the rock-shelters of France, the
lake-habitations of Switzerland. At the same time, I would dis-
claim all attempt to resolve their dates into precise terms of years.
I may merely add that the elaborate and careful observations of
Dr. Andrews on the raised beaches of Lake Michigan — observations
of a much more precise character than any v/hich, in so far as I
know, have been made of such deposits in Europe — enable him to
calculate the time which has elapsed since J^orth America rose out
of the waters of the glacial period as between 5,500 and 7,500 years.
This fixes at least the possible duration of the human period in
North America, though I believe there are other lines of evidence
Avhich would reduce the residence of man in America to a much
shorter time. Longer periods have, it i3 true, been deduced from
the delta of the Mississippi and the gorge of Niagara ; but the de-
posits of the former have been found by Hilgard to be in great part
marine, and the excavation of the latter began at a period probably
long anterior to the advent of man." '
In this brief survey instances of the several classes of archaeolog-
ical and geological facts adduced in proof of a high ^he result
antiquity of man are reviewed. Among 'them are in- satiskactorv.
stances regarded as most decisive of the question. The criticism of
Dawson at least places their conclusiveness in uncertainty ; and if
it is not proved beyond question that the time of man's presence in
the world must be limited to from 8,000 to 10,000 years, neither is
it proved that his time is greater. In his elaborate discussion of
tnis question Southall reviews all these instances, and finds them
inconclusive of a high antiquity of man.'' Such, likewise, is the
conclusion of Winchell from the same facts. ""
The argument from the growth of language is far less in use than
'^Journal of Geological Society, vol. xxv. '^ Silliman^s Journal, 1868.
'Dawson : Story of the Earth and Man, pp. 392-296.
* The Recent Origin of Man. ^ Pre-adamites, pp. 421-426.
366 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
others. Argyll distinctly names it in his classification, as pre-
TiMK REQUIRED ^^^usly givcn by reference, but the use he makes of it is
FOR LAN- rather to prove the unity than the antiquity of man. He
ouAGE. points out the now familiar fact that comparative phi-
lology furnishes a law by which widely diverse races may be traced
back to a common ethnic unity.' There is still an indirect argu-
ment for the high antiquity of man. With the unity of the race
through a common parentage, there was originally but one language.
Hence there must be time in the existence of the race for the for-
mation of this original language, and of all the languages in the
use of man.
The doctrine of evolution requires a brutal character of primitive
ON THE iiian, with the merest rudiment of that rationality
GROUND OF which came with his higher development. Such a
tTOLUTioN. ^^^ might well be accounted speechless ; and the
creation of a language would indeed require a long time. But the
evidence of such a brutal character of primitive man is still want-
ing. The facts in the case refuse to satisfy the exigency of the
doctrine.
There is nothing in science to discredit the Mosaic account of
man's origin. In the sense of this account he was created in the
maturity of manhood, and in respect to his whole nature. A
mature body and an infantile mind would have made him a
monstrosity, with the slightest chance of survival. His mind was
created in the same maturity as his body, and with mental powers as
ready for normal action as the physical. It is also entirely consist-
ent with this account — indeed, we think it a rational requirement —
that primitive man was supernatu rally aided in his mental acquire-
ments. He did not have to wait upon the slow process of experi-
ence, but by divine inspiration came quickly to a knowledge of
nature and language. In this rational view, the original acquisition
of language required no measure of time which must push back the
origin of man into a high antiquity.
The immediate oifspring of Adam acquired language in the same
manner as children of the present dav, and in as brief
ONLY ONE ^ " ^ ,
ORIGINAL a time. Such continued to be the law through all the
LANGUAGi.. antediluvian centuries. Under the same law the pos#
diluvian race started anew. Language was already a possession,
and continued to be a transmission from generation to generation.
In all divisions into separate communities each division went out
with a language. Hence the multiplication of languages was by
variation, not by origination. There are no facts in the history of
' Pi'imeval Man, pp. 109-112.
TIME OF MAN'S ORIGIN. 367
the race which require the pure originality of more than one. Com-
parative philology clearly traces many widely variant languages
back to a few sources, and might reach a common source of all
did not the marks of an ultimate unity become invisible in the
dimness of antiquity. It thus appears that the assumption of a
vast extent of time as necessary to the successive originations of
many languages is utterly groundless.
Languages, however, are very many, and there must have been
time in the existence of the race for their formation.
... . TIME FOR THE
But m estimatmg the necessary time we must not over- many la n-
look the distinction between origination and variation. ^^'^^'^^•
In the former case we assume a speechless community in an infan-
tile mental state. With such facts, the necessary time could
hardly be measured. Even the possibility of a purely human crea-
tion of language in such a state is not yet a closed question. In
the other view, which accords with Scripture and is without the
opposition of scientific facts, language was a speedy acquisition
through a divine inspiration, with such mental development as
must go with the knowledge and use of language. All were thus
early in the possession of rational speech. Henceforth the for-
mation of new languages was by variation. This is often a rapid
process, as the facts of history prove. There are exceptional cases.
With a common education, a common literature, and a free inter-
course in the use of a common sjieech, there may be little change
through long periods of time. It is not under such conditions that
languages have been multiplied. It is when a larger community,
with a common language, separates into distinct communities, and
each begins a new life under changed conditions, that through a
process of variation the one language is soon multiplied into as
many as thes^ separate communities.
The facts of history show that this process is often a rapid one.
No long age is required for the formation of a new Ian- their rapiii
guage. The formation of many may proceed at once, formation.
The relative facts are sufficiently presented by Lyell,^ and also by
Southall." It is worthy of note that the two are in substantial
agreement respecting these facts, though the former maintains a
high antiquity of man, and the latter a recent origin. The material
point in which they agree, and which the facts verify, is that
under changed conditions new languages are rapidly formed. Thus
on the breaking up of the Eoman Empire and the distribution of
the j)eople into separate nationalities their common language was
soon transformed into the Romance — such as the French, Italian,
' Antiquity of Man, chap, xxiii. ^ Recent Origin of Man, pp. 25-30.
368 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
Spanish, and Portuguese. These languages, now spoken by so many
peoples, are not a thousand years old, and only the fraction of a
thousand was required for their formation. This is simply one
instance out of many given by the authors named.
This rapid formation of new languages is the material fact of
the question. It is the conclusion of Southall that of some five
thousand languages now spoken only a half-dozen are a thousand
years old. If such is the work of ten centuries, the formation of
languages requires no stretch of time conclusive of a high antiquity
of man.
Anotlier argument is based on the distinction of races. It does
RACIAL nis- iiot require a detail of all the facts open to its use, but
TixcTioNs. niay be given in its full strength on such general dis-
tinctions of race as the Caucasian, Mongolian, and Negro. The
argument is in two alleged facts: first, that such distinctions appear
with the dawn of history ; second, that only a very long time could
have produced them. Greater apparent strength must be conceded
to this argument on the theory of a unity of the human race. With
a plurality of origins such distinctions might have existed from
the beginning, and no time would be required for their origi-
nation, while with the unity of the race the necessary time must be
conceded. The early date of such distinctions cannot be disputed.
For instance, the Xegro, with his clearly marked characteristics,
appears in Egyptian archeology fifteen or twenty centuries before
the Christian era. It must be agreed that many other facts are
adduced which prove the first part of the argument — a very early
appearance of race distinctions.'
The second part, that only long ages could produce such varia-
xoLONG TiMK tlous, Is dlsputcd. Mauy facts in natural history prove
RE«i:iRKi>. the contrary. Fortunately, such facts have fallen
within historic times, particularly in tlie settlement of America,
where the process of change could be more accurately measured.
" In the domesticated races of animals, and the cultivated tx-ibes of
plants, the phenomena of variation have been most remarkably dis-
played. ""'* Dr. Pricliard cites many instances which illustrate and
verify his position. The discussion runs through many j)ages.'
The force of tliese facts is not affected by their limi cation to domes-
ticated animals and cultivated plants. The domestication and cul-
tivation merely furnish the new conditions under which these
' Lyell : Antiquitij of Man, pp. 385, 386; Lubbock: Prehistoric Times,
pp. 587, 588; Argyll: Primeval Man, pj?. 97-100 ; Winchell : Pre-adamites,
chap. xiii.
^PricharJ : Natural History of Man, p. '27. ^Ihid., pp. 23-50.
TIME OF MAN'S ORIGIiSr. 309
changes naturally arise. Further, such instances are more readily
open to observation ; and their selection is for this reason and not
because they exemplify any peculiar susceptibility to change.
It is a rational inference, and one supported by the strongest
analogies, that under new conditions man is subject to common law
like change, and in many respects, as the new con- *J*' t;"AK(jE.
ditions may greatly vary. " Races of men are subjected more than
almost any race of animals to the varied agencies of climate. Civ-
ilization produces even greater changes in tlieir condition than does
domestication in the inferior tribes. We may therefore expect to
find fully as great diversities in the races of men as in any of the
domesticated breeds. The influence of the mind must be more
extensive and powerful in its operations upon human beings than
upon brutes. And this difference transcends all analogy or com-
parison.'"
JSTor could the conditions of physiological variation be wanting in
the earlier state of man. As the race multijjlied, broader territories
would be required for its occupancy. Besides, the natural disposi-
tion of ma]iy would anticipate this exigency and push them out
into new and distant regions. It appears, accordingly, in the begin-
ning of history, and back of this in the relative facts of a:'cha?ology,
that at a very early day men occupied extensive readies of territory.
With this wide distribution there were great changes of climate
and new habits of life. Thus at a very early day tiiere were all the
new conditions necessary to the variations which appear in the dis-
tinctions of race.
Physiological changes have occurred in historic times, and in
comparatively brief periods.'' There are many such ixstancks ov
instances, 'j-'hey do not equal some of the deeper race <-"ange.
distinctions, but, with the brevity of their own period, are sufficient
to discredit tiie assumption of vast ages as necessary to such varia-
tions. Hence we need no vast time to account for the distinctions
of race which appear in the early history of man. A permissible
extension of biblical chronology to eight or ten thousand years
will suffice for the whole account.
4. Relation of the Question to Theology. — The antiquity of man
concerns the Scriptures in the matter of chronology. The ques-
tion might thus become one of exegesis or apologetics. However,
with the uncertainty of the earlier data for a biblical chronology
and the absence of any authoritative doctrine, there is little occa-
sion for such a question, except in issue with extreme assumptions
' Prichard : Natural History of Man, p. 75.
'•^ Southall : Recent Origin of Man,, pp. 20-28.
£5
370 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
respecting the antiquity of man. The question mostly concerns
doctrinal theoloijy through its relation to the unity
AS Rl-XATKIt TO SJ O J
THE UNITY OK of tlic racc. Theology is deeply concerned in this ques-
"*^' tion, and, therefore, in the question of antiquity v/ith
which it is very closely connected. With a limit of six thousand
years for the time of man on the earth, the unity of the race can-
not be maintained. This is rendered impossible specially by the
very early appearance of some of tlie deepest variations of race.
Only a plurality of origins could account for these early distinc-
tions. It is hence fortunate that the data of biblical chronology
do not commit us to a period so limited. The liigher the antiquity
of man, the more certain is the unity of the race. This position
will scarcely meet with any scientific dissent. Therefore the
evidences of a higher antiquity than the nsual reckoning of bib-
lical chronology, instead of causing anxiety, should be accepted with
favor. It thus appears that the antiquity of man is sj)ecially re-
lated to theology through the nnity of tlie race. " And precisely
in proportion as we value our belief in that iinity ought we to be
ready and willing to accept any evidence on the question of man's
antiquity. The older the human family can be proved to be, the
more possible and probp.ble it is that it has descended from a single
pair. My own firm belief is that all scientific evidence is in favor
of this conclusion ; and I regard all new proofs of the antiquity of
man as tending to establish it on a firmer basis." '
III. The Uxity of Man-.
1. Questio7i of a Unity of Species. — As the unity of man is def-
initely the question of a unity of species, we require for its proper
treatment a definite view of species. Seemingly, this is no easy
attainment, for definitions greatly vary. However, we may pass
with slight notice the polemics of the question, and present in a
brief statement all that our own discussion requires.
For any true sense of species we require its fundamental idea or
SENSE OF SPE- idcas. This principle will hardly be questioned ; and
^"^^- yet it cannot bring definitions into unity, for the rea-
son that these ideas differ in the view of different minds. We
appropriate the following: " Species is a collection of individuals
more or less resembling each other, which may be regarded as having
descended from a single primitive pair by an uninterrupted and nat-
ural succession of families."'^ There are in this definition two fun-
damental facts — resemblance and genetic connection. We should
' Argyll : Pi-imeval Man, p. 138.
' Quatref ages : The Human Species, p. 36.
THE UXITY OF MAX. 371
state more strongly the principle of filiation or genetic connection,
but not more strongly than the author holds it, as appears elsewhere.
The doctrine of species varies as it makes more fundamental the
one or the other of these ideas, or as it omits the one variations op
or the other. There are both forms of variation ; but "octrine.
mostly both ideas are embodied in definitions. After a statement of
the definitions by Eay and Tournefort, that of the former embody-
ing only the principle of filiation, and that of the latter only the
jirinciple of resemblance, Quatrefages proceeds to say : " Ray and
Tournefort have had from time to time a few imitators, who, in
their definition of species, have clung to one of the two ideas. But
the immense majority of zoologists have been aware of the impossi-
bility of separating them. To convince ourselves of this fact it is
only necessary to read the definitions which they have given. Each
one of them, from Buffon and Ouvier to MM. Chevreul and C. Vogt,
has, so to speak, proposed his own. Now, however they may differ
in other respects, they all agree in this. The terms of the defini-
tions vary, each endeavors to represent in the best manner possible
the complex idea of species ; some extend it still further, and con-
nect with it the idea of cycle and variation ; but in all the funda-
mental idea is the same."' This is the statement of an author at
once learned and candid, and who writes in open view of the modern
theories of evolution.
Professor Gray holds the same doctrine of species, and also sets it
forth as the more common doctrine of naturalists. We doctrine op
may cite a few of his statements : " The ordinary and ^'^^"^•
generally received view assumes the independent, specific creation
of each kind of plant and animal in a primitive stock, which repro-
duces its like from generation to generation, and so continues the
species."' "According to the succinct definition of Jussieu — and
that of Linnaeus is identical in meaning — a species is the perennial
succession of similar individuals in continued generations. The
species is the chain of which the individuals are the links. The
sum of the genealogically-connected similar individuals constitutes
the species, which thus has an actuality and ground of distinction
not shared by genera and other groups which were not supposed to
be genealogically connected." ^ Such is the doctrine of species held
' The Human Species, p. 36.
"Darwiniana, pp. 11, 12. For the same doctrine of species Gray cites the
definition of Linnaeus : " Species tot sunt, quot diversas formas ab initio pro-
duxit Infinitum Ens ; quae formae, secundum generationis inditas leges, pro-
duxere plures, at sibi semper similes."
^Darwiniana, pp. 163, 164.
372 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
by Professor Gray, and which he sets forth as the more common
doctrine of naturalists. His learning and candor, which no one
will question, give weight to his statements. Any favorable view of
evolution which Professor Gray may hold does not really affect his
doctrine of species. His theism is thorough and devout, and for
him evolution would simply represent the mode of the divine agency
in the origin of species. This would be a variation from the view
of an immediate creation of the progenitors of species, but a varia-
tion which would not change the fundamental ideas of the doctrine.
"While the ideas of genetic connection and resemblance are both
THE DEEPER regarded as fundamental in the doctrine of species, they
IDEA. are not so in Just the same form or measure. The
deeper idea is that of genetic connection. It is the ground of like-
ness among the individuals. The likeness may be widely variable,
while the genealogical connection must be constant and complete.
With this connection the species abides, however slight the resem-
blance.
2. Theory of Unity 2i'ith Plurality of Origins. — It is now a
familiar fact that Louis Agassiz, a very eminent scientist of our
own country, held distinct origins of the human races. Indeed, he
held the same doctrine respecting different races in all the lower
forms of life. However, the doctrine of Agassiz had no connection
Avith the Darwinian evolution, for to that he was oj)euly opjjosed.
In his view the several human races originated in separate divine
creations. Thus, instead of one original creation of a single pair as
the common parentage of man, there were several such creations as
the heads of the several races. The doctrine is most thoroughly
theistic, and the extreme of supernaturalism respecting the origin
of man, and, indeed, of all the lower forms of life.
With such separate creations, the human races might still be one
UNITY WITH ^^ ^^^ ^^-'^ facts distinctive or constitutive of species,
gEi'ARATE oRi- exccpt tlic ouc fact of genealogical connection. AV'ith-
^^^^' out this connection God could so constitute the several
races that they should possess in common all other characteristics
distinctive of species. So far the unity of man could consist with
a plurality of origins.
Some naturalistic evolutionists hold to separate origins of the
„ „ several human races. If such an origin of man is pos-
AS HELD BY . O 1
K VOLITION- sible, there may have been a plurality of origins. If
'^^" the requisite natural conditions could meet in one point,
BO might they in peveral, or even in many. In such a case, however,
there could be no account of the unquestionable unity of the several
races in specifical facts. Such origins are assumed to be widely
THE UNITY OF MAN. 373
separated in time and place, and hence an exact identity of natural
conditions could not be the remotest probability. But if the envi-
ronment is a strongly molding force over all the forms of organic
life, the widely different conditions of human evolutions must have
caused wide differences in the products. Hence such plurality of
human evolutions is disproved by the specifical unity of the several
races. This consequence cannot be voided by alleging the distinc-
tions of the several races as the whole account of the different natural
conditions of their separate evolutions. These distinctions are merely
superficial or incidental, and fully accounted for by differences of
environment in the actual life, while in all the intrinsic and consti-
tutive facts of mankind the several races are without distinction.
Mostly such plurality of origins is maintained as a necessary ac-
count of the distinctions of race. It might be held as
. . . *= AS RELATED TO
Simplifying the question resperctmg the distribution of racial dis-
mankind, but, with the present knowledge of facts, can 'r^^^''^'"^'^-
no longer be claimed as necessary to its solution. With the pro-
foundest students of the natural sciences, and particularly of anthro-
pology, a unity of origin makes no serious difficulty in accounting
for that distribution. Some of the most diverse and widely sepa-
rated races are easily traced back to an earlier connection, whilo
decisive facts warrant the inference of an original unity. With
such facts already in hand, we need not be perplexed with any
questions of distribution which may still wait for their interpre-
tation.
3. Distinctions of Race and the Question of Unity. — The dis-
tinctions of race constitute the chief objection to the specific unity
of mankind. There are wide variations of human type, particularly
in size, form, and color. Hence the question is, whether such
variations are consistent with a common jjarentage, or whether the
several races require separate origins. This is largely a question
of science, and so far we must look to scientists for its proper treat-
ment. At least we are dependent upon them for the requisite facts.
Scientists are not agreed in a common doctrine. Some hold a plu-
rality of human origins. With such, however, there is no agree-
ment respecting the number, and the scale runs from four or five
up to sixty or more. The weight of scientific authority is for a
unity of origin.
The question of species is common to the manifold forms of veg-
etable and animal life. Hence on the ground of anal- „ ,^„ . „
o , OTHER APPLI-
ogy the variation of types, as related to the unity of cations op
species, is properly studied in these broader spheres. ^^^' Q^'^^'^'''"'''-
If variations of race appeared only in the case of man, a fixity of
374 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
type in the many other species would hirgely discredit his unity.
If in those species there were many variations of type, but only
slight in comparison with the distinctions in man, such a difference
would place his specifical unity in uncertainty. On the other hand,
if variations of type are common to all species, and are often as great
or even greater in the spheres of botany and zoology tlian in the
distinctively human sphere, then the objection to the unity of man
on the ground of the distinctions of race is discredited and denied
all logical force. In the light of natural history many such varia-
tions are open and clear. It is in the use of such facts that scien-
tists easily obviate the chief objection to the specifical unity of man.
The tendency of species to diverse and wide variations, and the
TENDENCY TO actuality of such variations, are clearly pointed out by
VARIATION. Professor Gray.' We may cite two brief passages out of
the references. *' As to amount of variation, there is the common
remark of naturalists that the varieties of domesticated plants or
animals often differ more widely than do the individuals of distinct
species in a wild state : and even in nature tlie individuals of some
species are known to vary to a degree sensibly wider than that which
separates related species." '^But who can tell us what amount of
difference is compatible with community of origin ? " Community
of origin is with this author the deepest fact of species. The instances
which he adduces as illustrative of actual variation clearly show
that a very wide range is compatible with imity of species. Hence
the variety of human races is compatible with the specific unity of
man.
Quatrefages treats the question in the same method, and reaches
THE VIEW OF the same result ; only, his treatment is much fuller,
QUATREFAOEs. aud, by so much, with higher cumulative force. He
thus states his own method: ''Any one really desirous of formings
an opinion upon the unity or multiplicity of the human species
should therefore discover what are the facts and phenomena which
characterize races and species in plants and animals; then turn
to man and compare the facts and phenomena there presented with
those which botanists and zoologists have observed in the other
kingdoms. If the facts and phenomena which distinguish the
human groups are those which, in other organized and living
beings differentiate species, he will then legitimately iiifcr the mul-
tiplicity of human species; if, however, these phenomena and facts
are characteristic of race in the two former kingdoms, he must con-
clude in favor of specific unity." ^ In this legitimate method the
question is fully discussed. Many facts are adduced as instances of
' Danoiniana, pp. 26, 27, 97, 111, 203. * The Human Species, pp. 41, 42-
THE UNITY OF MAN. 3V5
wide variations of type within well-known species. It is clearly
pointed out that in animal and plant races variations attain limits
never exceeded, and rarely reached, by the differences between
human groups.' Such variations are pointed out in all the partic-
ulars of size, color, and form, and are shown to be equal to such as
appear in the differences of human races. The conclusion of the
author is fully warranted : " The several facts which I have here
enumerated seem to me sufficient to justify the proposition
which I asserted at the commencement of the chapter, namely,
that the limits of variation are almost always more extensive
between certain races of animals than between the most distinct
human groups. Consequently, however great the differences exist-
ing between these human groups may be, or may appear to be, to
consider them as specific characters is a perfectly arbitrary estima-
tion of their value. It is, to say the least, quite as rational, quite
as scientific, to consider these differences only as characters of race,
and even on that account to refer all the human groups to a single
species."'* If the specific unity of man is not thus fully proved,
the chief objection which it encounters in the distinctions of race
is thoroughly obviated. But only the full discussion of tliis author
can give the full force of his argument.^
Against this account of the distinctions of race, it is alleged that
the varieties of type are as remarkable for their fixity as fixation of
for their early appearance ; that through all the cent- racial types.
uries of history and the changes of environment they remain the
same. From this alleged persistence of human types it is inferred
that they could not have originated in differences of environment.
On the validity of this inference, it would follow that each race is a
distinct species, with its own separate origin.
There is a persistency of human types through long periods of
history, and under great changes of climatical condi- ko disproof
tion. So much is readily conceded. However, this of unity.
concession falls very far short of all that is claimed in the above
argument for a plurality of species. That the several types
undergo no change, or only the slightest change, is not at all
conceded. Many variations have occurred in historic times, and
even in comparatively recent times. A selection of such instances
is given by Dr. A. H. Strong.* The brevity of his summary renders
it very suitable for citation : " Instances of physio- instances or
logical change as the result of new conditions : The change.
Irish, driven by the English two centuries ago from Armagh and
' Tlie Human Species, pp. 43, 43. ^ Ibid., p. 55. ^Ibid., chaps, iv-vi.
* Systematic Theology, pp. 242, 243.
3VG SYSTE.MATIC THEOLOGY.
tlie south of Down, have become prognathous like the Austra-
lians. The inhabitants of New England have descended from the
English, yet they have already a physical type of their own. The
Indians of Xorth America, or at least certain tribes of them, have
pornuinently altered the shape of the skull by bandaging the head
in infancy. The Sikhs of India, since the establishment of Babel
Nina's religion (1500 A. D.) and their consequent advance in civil-
ization, have changed to a longer head and more regular features,
so that they are now distinguished greatly from their neighbors, the
Afghans, Thibetans, Hindus. The Ostiak savages have become the
Magyar nobility of Hungary. The Turks in Europe are, in cranial
shape, greatly in advance of the Turks in Asia from whom they
descended. The Jews are confessedly of one ancestry ; yet we have
among them the light-haired Jews of Poland, the dark Jews of Spain,
and the Ethiopian Jews of the Nile valley. The Portuguese who set-
tled in the East Indies in the sixteenth century are now as dark in
complexion as tlio Hindus themselves. Africans become lighter
in complexion as they go up from the alluvial river-banks to higher
land, or from the coast ; and on the contrary the coast tribes which
drive out the Negroes of the interior and take their territory end. by
becoming Negroes themselves."
From such facts it is reasonably inferable that there is no fixity
of human types which disproves their origin in climat-
LOGIC OP THE . r -r . ^ , . ,1 • , -, J
iLLusTRA- ical conditions. It is true that m the instances cited
TioNs. there are no variations equal to the deeper distinctions
of race ; but this lack is fully compensated by the difference of
time. In thg one case wo have, at most, only a few centuries ; in
the other, thousands of years. If in the shorter time such physio-
loffical variations could arise from chanfires of environment, the
deeper distinctions of race could so arise in the vastly longer time.
Admitting the slightness of variation under great climatical
change, as claimed in many instances, there is an interpretation
which obviates all inference against the origin of race distinc-
tions from natural causes. This interpretation lies in the fact
that, with great climatical change, there is in many
C A U S E S O F ' . " , . , i < 1 11
CHANGE oBvi- modcm instances but slight exposure to the natural
"*^'^°" causes of physiological change. " There are some
reasons which make it probable that changes of external condition,
or rather of country, produce less cfiect now than was formerly the
case. At present, when men migrate they carry with them the
manners and appliances of civilized life. They build houses more
or less lil:e those to wliich they have been accustomed, carry with
them flocks and herds, and introduce into their new country the
THE UNITY OF MAN. 377
principal j)lP4.nts wliicli served tliem for food in the old. If their
new abode is cold they increase their clothing, if warm they di-
minish it. In these and a hundred other ways the effect which
would otherwise be produced is greatly diminished.^'' The facts
were very different in many early migrations. Without agriculture
or domestic animals, without homes for shelter, with only the rudest
weapons, men were wholly dependent upon natural resources, and
would be without protection from the natural causes of physiolog-
ical change in any new climatical conditions. It is thus obvious
that such change would be more rapid and extensive than in many
modern migrations. It follows that ,the slightness of change in
such modern instances cannot disprove the origin of race distinc-
tions from natural causes under the early conditions of full expos-
ure to their force.
This question is placed in yet anotlier view. It is the view that
the infancy of a species is the time of its most rapid period of
variation into races or types, that such variations soon rapid cpiange.
reach their limit, after which the several tj-pes become so fixed as to
suffer little further change. Respecting the Negro — the standard
instance of an early and persistent type : " What it does prove is a
fact equally obvious from the study of post-pliocene mollusks and
other fossils, namely, that now species tond rapidly to vary to the
utmost extent of their pocsiblo limits, and then to remain station-
ary for an indefinite timc."^ It appears in these statements that
such laws are not assumptions to meet a doctrinal exigency, but
scientific inductions on the ground of facts. Nor are such facts
limited to the human species and races, but are foimd broadly in
natural history. With this wider sphere of inductive facts, the more
certain are these laws. Their relation to the distinctions of race is
obvious. They account for the variation of species into these dis-
tinctions on natural grounds ; for the early aiDpearance of the sev-
eral human races ; and also for their permanence. It follows that
neither the early appearance nor the permanence of the several
human types is any disproof of their origin in natural causes.
Neither fact, therefore, is any disproof of the specifical unity of
mankind. '
4. Scientific Evidences of Specifical Unity. — A sufficient account
of the distinctions of race in natural causes is not in itself con-
clusive of a specifical unity of mankind. Its direct logical value
' Lubbock : Prehistoric Times, p. 589.
' Dawson : Story of the Earth and Man, p. 360.
^ Pricliard ; Natural History of Man, sec. xlviii ; Wliedon : Methodist Quar-
terly Review, 1878, p. 565.
378 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
is iu the refutation of tlie tirgumeut from these distinctions for a
phirulity of species. There is, however, a large indirect value for
the doctrine of unity. In the history of relative facts there is no
call for the agency of God in repeated original creations of man-
kind. Hence a single original creation is the only rational infer-
ence. Beyond this inference there is a further value in the refuta-
tion of that chief argument for a plurality of species : it clears the
way for all the more direct evidences of the unity of man. A
summary of these evidences must now be given.
There is a oneness of races in physical characteristics. The dis-
piiYsioLOGic- tinctions are superficijl, and the result of local influ-
AL oNEXKss. enccs. The oneness in all intrinsic facts of the physical
constitution is as real as. in any animal species. The human body is
intrinsically one among all races : one in chemical elements ; one
in anatomical structure ; one in physiological constitution ; one in
pathological susceptibilities.'
There is among all the different races a oneness of psychological
PSYCHOLOGIC- endowment. This oneness appears as the result of a
ALONKNEss. thorough analysis of the facts concerned in the ques-
tion. Superficially, differences are many and obvious. It is easy
to set in wide contrast the barbaric J^egro and the cultured.
Christianized Caucasian. There are, however, instances of little less
difference between one and another of the Caucasian race. But in
this case the difference is understood to be only accidental or
superficial, while there is still a oneness in all the intrinsic facts of
mind. A thorough analysis gives the same result respecting all
the races of men. The mental differences are accidental or super-
ficial, while the intrinsic facts of mind are the same in all. There
are the same sensibilities, with their marvelous adjustment to the
manifold relations of life ; the same intellectual faculties, which
constitute the rationality of mind ; the same moral and religious
nature, which, while it may sink to barbarism and idolatry in the
Caucasian, may rise to the highest moral and Christian life in the
Mongolian and Negro.''
Prichard carries the discussion of these questions through many
ARGUMKXT OP P^gcs, aud wltli liis characteristic lucidity and candor.
PRICHARD. "Widely diverse races are brought into view, that their
oneness in the essential facts of mind may be fairly tested. Any
one who follows the author with a mind open to the truth must find
' Quatrefagos : The Human Species, book ix ; Prichard : Natural History of
Man, pp. 477-486.
^ Quatrefages : The Human Species, pp. 431-498 ; Domer : Sifstem of Christian
Doctrine, vol. ii, pp. 92, 93 ; Prichard : Natural History of Man, pp. 486-546.
THE UNITY OF MAN. 379
it most difficult to reject his conclusion : " We contemplate among
ail the diversified trihes, who are endowed with reason and speech,
the same internal feelings, appetencies, aversions ; the same inward
convictions, the same sentiments of subjection to invisible powers,
and, more or less fully developed, of accountableness or resjionsibil-
ity to unseen avengers of wrong and agents of retributive justice,
from whose tribunal men cannot even by death escape. We find
every-where the same susceptibility, though not always in the same
degree of forwardness or ripeness of improvement, of admitting
the cultivation of these universal endowments, of opening the eyes
of the mind to the more clear and luminous views which Christian-
ity unfolds, of becoming molded to the institutions of religion and
of civilized life : in a word, the same inward and mental nature is
to be recognized in all the races of men. When we compare this
fact with the observations which have been heretofore fully estab-
lished as to the specific instincts and separate ps5^chical endowments
of all the distinct tribes of sentient beings in the universe, we are
entitled to draw confidently the conclusion that all human races are
of one species and one family.''^ '
The sexual union of the most distinct races is just as fruitful as
that within the purest and most definite race. The absence of
progeny of such union are entirely free from hybridity. hybridity.
Their fruitfulness is j)ermanent and without decrease. If in some
instances it may be less, in others it is greater, so that there is a full
average. Here are facts utterly unknown in all the crossings of
animal species. It is only from the union of closely allied species
that there is any produce. There is only the most limited fruitful-
ness of such offspring ; never a permanent fruitfulness. Here is
the law of hybridity ; a law which is the chief guide of science in
the analysis and classification of species. But this law is wholly
unknown among human races. It follows that human races are not
separate species, but simply varieties of one species.
The law of hybridity which limits the production of a perma-
nently fruitful progeny to the species, and so denies it a great law
to the crossing of species, is one of the most obvious ^^ nature.
laws of natural history. A mere statement of the relative facts
must make this plain. " The law of nature decrees that creatures
of every kind shall increase and multiply by propagating their own
kind, and not another. If we search the whole world, we shall
probably not find one instance of an intermediate tribe produced
between any two distinct species, ascertained to be such. If such
a thing were discovered it would be a surprising anomaly. The
' Prichard : Natural History of Man, pp. 545, 54G.
380 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
existence of such a law as tliis in the economy of nature is almost self-
evident, or at least becomes evident from the most superficial and
general survey of the phenomena of the living world : for if, as some
have argued, there were no such principle in operation, how could
the order, and at the same time the variety, of the animal and veg-
etable creation be preserved ? If the different races of beings were
intermixed in the ordinary course of things, and hybrid races were
reproduced and continued without impediment, the organized world
would soon present a scene of universal confusion ; its various
tribes would become every-where blended together, and we should
at length scarcely discover any genuine or uncorrupted races. It
may, indeed, be said that this confusion of all the living tribes
would long ago have taken place. But how op2)Osite from such a
state of things is the real order of nature ! The same uniform and
regular production of species still holds throughout the world ; nor
are the limits of each distinct sj)ecies less accurately defined than
they probably were some thousands of years ago. It is plain that
the conservation of distinct tribes has been secured, and that uni-
versally and throughout all the different departments of the organic
creation." ' It thus appears that the very possibility of a natural
science is conditioned on the law which limits the production of a
permanently fruitful progeny to the species. Hence the fact of
such a science is the fact of such a law. The presence of this law
is ever the proof of specifical oneness, however wide the variations
of race. It follows that the several human races, among which this
law is without any limitation, are one species.
" The infertility, or, if you will, the restricted and rapidly limited
fertility between species, and the impossibility of natural
LIKE THE LAW "^ ^ ' ...
OF GKAviTA- forcBS, wlicu Icft to themselves, producing series of in-
'^^^^' termediary beings between two given specific types, is
one of those general facts which we call a law. This fact has an
importance in the organic world equal to that rightly attributed to
attraction in the sidereal world. It is by virtue of the latter that
the celestial bodies preserve their respective distances, and complete
their orbits in the admirable order revealed by astronomy. The
law of the stcr Hit y of species produces the same result, and main-
tains between species and between different groups in animals and
plants all those relations which, in the paleontological ages, as well
as in our own, form the marvelous whole of the organic empire.
Imagine the suppression of the laws which govern attraction in the
heavens, and what chaos would immediately be the result. Sup-
press upon earth the law of crossing, and the confusion would be
' Prichard : Natural History of Man, pp. 12, 13.
THE UNITY OF MAN. 381
immense. It is scarcely possible to say where it would stop. After
a few generations the groups which we call genera, families, orders,
and classes would most certainly have disappeared, and the branches
also would rapidly have become affected. It is clear that only a few
centuries would elapse before the animal and vegetable kingdoms
fell into the most complete disorder. Now order has existed in both
kingdoms since the epoch when organized beings first peopled the
solitudes of our globe, and it could only have been established and
preserved by virtue of the impossibility of a fusion of species with
each other through indifferently and indefinitely fertile crossings."'
The doctrine here is the same as that given from Prichard. These
eminent authors did not rest the question with such summary state-
ment, however decisive in itself. Each carefully and thoroughly
studied the relative facts in natural history, and found them in full
accord with the doctrine as summarily stated. We have the same
conclusion as previously given. With the narrowly limited fruit-
fulness of all specifical crossings, the unrestricted fruitfulness be-
tween all the human races is conclusive of their specifical unity.
So far, we have simply stated as a fact the average and permanent
fruitfulness of the progeny from the union of the most
. r O J ABSENCE OF
distinct human races. No proof has been offered, hybridity
There is little need of any formal argument. The fact "^'^^'^'^°-
is too open and too well known to be seriously questioned. It is
verified by innumerable instances in modern history. These in-
stances arise speciall)^ in the intercourse of Eurojoeans with the
Negro and the Indian or Redskin of America. The produce of such
intercourse is fruitful without any stint. Hence every- where mixed
races have arisen. Their permanence is conclusive of their freedom
from the hybridity which suffers only a temporary existence to the
progeny of specifical crossings. The facts are amply given, and with
scientific clearness, by the authors recently cited.'' It will suffice to
give their conclusion. " It appears to be unquestionable that inter-
mediate races of men exist and are propagated, and that no imjied-
iment whatever exists to the perpetuation of mankind when the most
dissimilar varieties are blended together. We hence derive a con-
clusive proof, unless there be in the instance of human races an
exception to the universally prevalent law of organized nature, that
all the tribes of men are of one family, " ' Quatref ages, having also
reviewed the relative facts, says : " Thus, in every case crossings
' Quatref ages : The Human Species, pp. 80, 81 .
* Prichard : Natural History of Man, pp. 18-36 ; Quatrefages : The Human
Species, pp. 85-87.
' Prichard : Natural History of Man, p. 26.
382 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
between human groups exhibit the phenomena characteristic of
mongrels and never those of hybrids. Therefore, these human
BUT ONE nu- groups, however different they may be, or appear to be,
MAN SPECIES, jji-e only races of one and the same species and not dis-
tinct species. Therefore, there is but o?ie human species, taking
this term species in the acceptation employed when speaking of
animals and plants."' This author is fully warranted in these
concluding words: '^Nowl wish that candid men, who are free
from party spirit or prejudices, would follow me in this view, and
study for themselves all these facts, a few of wdiich I have only
touched upon, and I am perfectly convinced that they wall, with
the great men of whom I am only the disciple — with Linnagus,
Buffon, Lamarck, Cuvier, Geoffrey, Humboldt, and Midler — arrive
at the conclusion that all men belong to the same species, and that
there is but one species of man."
Comparative philology is a witness for the specifical unity of man.
COMPARATIVE Thls reccut science is already a chief light in the study
PHILOLOGY. Qf ethnology. Affinities of widely separated races are
thus discovered, and these races are traced back to a common origin
and a primary ethnic unity. The existence of the same words in
different languages is the proof of a primary connection and a com-
mon original. No principle of the inductive sciences is more valid.
The primary unity of such languages carries with it the ethnic
unity of the races which use them. " It is absolutely certain from
the character of the French, Spanish, and Italian languages that
those nations are in large measure the common descendants of the
Latin race. "When, therefore, it can be shown that the languages of
different races or varieties of men are radically the same, or derived
from a common stock, it is impossible rationally to doubt their
descent from a common ancestry. Unity of language, therefore,
proves unity of species because it proves unity of origin. " "
Comparative philologists have thus been able to bring" back into a
primary unity many widely separate and w'idely diverse
VERSE LAN- pcoplcs. Tlic affinity of languages leads up to a primary
GUAGEs. unity of language, and hence to the unity of man.
" The universal affinity of language is placed in so strong a light
that it must be considered by all as completely demonstrated. It
appears inexplicable on any other hypothesis than that of admitting
fragments of a primary language to exist through all the languages
of the Old and New World." ^ " Much as all these languages differ
from each other, they appear, after all, to be merely branches of one
' The Human Sjyecics, pp. 87, 88.
^ Hodge : Systematic Theology, vol. ii, p. 89. ' KHaproth.
THE UNITY OF MAN. 383
coinmon stem/" ''As far as the organic languages of Asia and
Europe are concerned, the human race is of one kindred,
of one descent." " Our historical researches respecting
language have led us to facts which seemed to oblige us to assume
the common historical origin of the great families into which we
found the nations of Asia and Europe to coalesce. The four fami-
lies of Turanians and Iranians, of Khamites and Shemites, reduced
themselves to two, and these again possessed such mutual material
affinities as can neither be explained as accidental nor as being so
by a natural external necessity ; but they must be historical, and
therefore imply a common descent." ''The Asiatic origin of all
these [American] tribes is as fully proved as the unity of family
among themselves."* We may add one more testimony: "The
comparative study of languages shows us that races now separated
by vast tracts of land are allied together, and have migrated from
one primitive seat. . . . The largest field for such investigations
into the ancient condition of language, and, consequently, into the
period when the whole family of mankind was, in the strictest sense
of the word, to be regarded as one living whole, presents itself in
the long chain of Indo-Germanic languages, extending from the
Ganges to the Iberian extremity of Europe, and from Sicily to the
IsTorth Cape."' The sense is that the inheritance of all these lan-
guages from a common source proves the original unity of the many
widely different peoples which they represent.
Comparative philology thus makes it clear and sure that peoj)le8
widely separated in place, and representing very dis-
tinct racial types, were originally one family and one
blood. What is thus proved to bo true of a part may be true of the
whole. Indeed, in the absence of all disproof, the only rational
inference is that all human families were originally one family.
More and more is the wider study of comparative philology pointing
to this truth. The results already attained render groundless the
distinctions of race for a plurality of origins, and prove beyond
question that more or less of the several species as held by polygen-
ists are mere varieties of the one species.
5. Tlie Scripture Sense of Unity. — The whole human race is
lineally descended from Adam and Eve. There is hence ^ common
a genetic connection of all mankind. This is the obvi- parentage.
ous sense of the Scriptures. It appears in the more definite state-
' Schlegel : The Philosophy of History, p. 92, London, 1847.
^ Btinsen : Philosophy of Universal History, vol. ii, pp. 4, 99, 112 ; the last
three authors as cited by Macdonald : Creation and the Fall, p. 381.
^Humboldt : Cosmos, vol. it, p. 111.
384 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
ments respecting the origin of man and the peopling of the world,
and also in various incidental and doctrinal references to the race.
There is the creation of a single pair as the beginning of the human
species and the progenitors of all mankind. It was for them to be
fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth.' Such was the or-
der of Providence, and the multiplying people down to the time of
the flood were in unbroken genetic connection Avith them.' The
repeopling of the world was from the sons of Noah, who clearly
stand in lineal descent from Adam and Eve.' All these facts are
openly given in the earlier chapters of Genesis.
The notable words of Paul to the Athenians must mean the gen-
ealogical oneness of mankind. "And (God) hath made
of one blood all nations of men for to dwell on all the
face of the earth.'" The New Version drops the word blood; so
that in its rendering we read simply, "And he made of one every
nation of men." The weight of critical authority is against the
genuineness of a'ijia in the Greek text. This was the reason for
the new rendering. The change strengthens the sense of a genea-
logical unity. While the words "of one blood" — ef kvbg aluaro^ —
clearly point to such a unity, they might be claimed to express
simply a oneness of nature which is consistent with a plurality of
origins. The new rendering is in no sense open to such a claim.
AVe cannot so supplement the words " made of one " as to read, " made
of one nature or kind." Of one man, of one father, or of one parent-
age, is the only permissible rendering. There was reason with Paul
for the utterance of such a truth in the presence of his Greek audi-
ence. On the notion of autochthonism the Athenians claimed for
themselves a distinct origin, and thereon the distinction of a special
superiority over other nations. Now as on this great occasion Paul
declares all men by their creation to be the offspring of God,* so he
declares all to be mediately the offspring of a common parentage.
This is the meaning of the words, " And he made of one every nation
of men for to dwell on all the face of the earth." This is the deep-
est unity of man ; not only that of a specifical oneness of nature,
but also that of a genealogical oneness.
There are other words of Paul which give the same sense.' In
CLEAR TESTi- ^^^ passagcs given by reference both the prevalence of
•^•oNY- sin with all men and the death of all are traced back to
a connection with tlie sin of Adam. These facts involve doctrinal
questions which more properly belong to another division of the
subject, but irrespective of this have special significance for the
' Gen. i, 27, 28. ^ Gen. v, 1, 2. "Gen. x, 1, 32. •« Acts xvii, 26.
' Acts xvii, 28. « Rom. v, 12, 17-19 ; 1 Cor. xv, 31, 22.
THE UNITY OF MAN. 385
present point. The common sinfulness of the race could not in the
deep sense of Paul be consequent on the sis of Adam without a
common genealogical connection with him. Neither could there
be the consequence of death as common to all without such a con-
nection. So much may be said with the fullest warrant, and quite
irrespective of certain doctrinal grounds of such consequences as
set forth in theology.^
6. A Special Theory of Pre-adamites. — This theory is the same
in principle as the polygenism which holds a plurality of origins
for the more distinct races. It is peculiar in claiming for itself
entire consistency with the Scriptures, and even that it is necessary
to their proper interpretation. For many centuries there was no^
question in the Church respecting either the unity of man or the^
true primariness of Adam. The new theory was ini- theory of
tiated by Peyrerius, a Romish priest. His first work ^ peyrkrus.
— a disquisition on Rom. v, 12-14 — appeared in 1G55. The exist-
ence of men before Adam is maintained as the sense of the passage
named. The next year this work was followed by another from
the same author, with a fuller discussion of the same theory. The
theory encountered strong opposition, and soon sank into silence.
This silence continued for two centuries, when the question was
revived.
The occasion for the new discussion was furnished in the dis-
covery of facts which seemingly point to an antiquity the theory
of man far beyond the reach of biblical chronology. revived.
The aim is to adjust the alleged facts to the limitations of this
chronology. The method is to regard Adam, not as the first man,
but as the first of a distinct race, which appears in the opening of
biblical history. This Adamic race falls within the limits of bib-
lical chronology, while the facts which point to a much higher an-
tiquity of man must be interpreted on the theory of earlier races.
The existence of such races is in the fullest consistency with the
Scriptures. Such is the theory.
While the advocates of this theory agree that the Adamic race is
distinct from others, and of later origin, they are not agreed as to
its ethnic composition. For instance, the Adamic race is with
Peyrerius simply the Hebrew race; with McCausland, the Caucasian
in distinction from the Mongolian and Negroid; with Winchell, the
Mediterranean or white race, but as including Japhetites, Semites,
and Hamites.'
' Van Oosterzee : Christian Dor/matics, vol. i, pp. 363, 8G4 ; Macdonald : Cre-
ation and the Fall, p. 373 ; Dorner : System of Christian Doctrine, vol. ii, p. 89.
^ Prce-adamitos, etc. ^ Pre-adamites, p. 52.
26
38G SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
As this theory claims to be thoroughly scriptural, very natu-
rally the proof of it is souirht in the Scriptures. Its
OLAIU OF
scRiPTiKK later advocates go beyond the Scriptures into such
GROUND. facts of ethnology, geology, and archaeology as are
usually adduced in proof of a high antiquity of man. In this,
however, we need not here follow them, as we have previously con-
sidered these facts. It could not be overlooked by thoughtful writers
who appeal to the Scriptures for proof of this theory that it is in
seeming collision with fundamental truths of Christian anthropol-
ogy and soteriology. Nor could all endeavor toward a reconcilia-
tion be omitted. Here the theory encounters insuperable difficult}',
as we shall point out in tlie proper place. Later advocates of the
theory on scriptural grounds very properly omit the argument of
Peyrerius from the notable passage of Paul in the Epistle to the
Komans.' So far from being the ground of an argument, the rec-
onciliation of the passage with the new theory is above the power
of its advocates.
Much use is made of familiar incidents in the life of Cain. He
is a fratricide and a fugitive, and suffers the remorse
INCIUKNTS IN . . TT
THK i.iFK OF of sin and the severity of the divme judgment. He
^^^^' is seized with the dread of vengeance: '* Every one
that fmdeth me shall slay me." God in pity sets upon him a
seal of protection, " lest any one finding him should slay him.'*
So Cain went forth from the presence of the Lord, and dwelt in
the land of Nod, on the east of Eden. He next appears in mar-
ried life. There is born to him a son, whom he names Enoch. He
builds a city and calls it after the name of this son.'^ In view of
such facts the argument for pre-adamites is easily constructed. On
the face of the narrative, Adam and Eve and Cain at this time
composed the whole Adamic family. Who then were the slayers
whose vengeance Cain so dreaded? And where did he find a wife?
And how could he so soon build a city without the co-operation of
people already existing? And why should a city be built, except
for the occupancy of such people? The interpretation of these
facts requires the existence of pre-adamites.^
The argument is plausible, and seemingly possesses much force.
PLAtTsiBiLiTY It might be deemed conclusive, if the question hinged
OK THK CASE, entirely upon the incidents here narrated. Such, how-
ever, is not the case. Many other facts concern the question, and
such as are more decisive of the issue. For any conclusiveness,
' Rom. V, 12-14. 2 Gen. iv, 8-17.
' McCansland : Adam and the Adamite, pp. 194-197 ; Winchell : Pre-adam-
ites, pp. 188-193.
THE UNITY OF MAN. 387
the argument requires an unwarranted assumption of fullness in
this early Aclamic history. For aught we know, the family of
Adam may have already multiplied to a very considerable number,
at least to one sufficient for the incidents in the life of Cain. Tlie
birth of only Cain and Abel previous to that of Seth is, in view of
the time given by the manhood of both before this event, an un-
reasonable supposition. The omission of otlier names is nothing
against the assumption of other births. Neither is the formal
naming of the three, which no doubt was for special reasons. Thus,
on the reasonable supposition of a considerable increase in the
family of Adam beyond the names given, the incidents in the life
of Cain are sufficiently provided for without the existence of pre-
adamites. In view of very decisive facts of Scripture against this
theory, we very much prefer the above solution of the questions
arising from such incidents.
The unity of man by genealogical descent from Adam and Eve
implies the marriage of brothers and sisters in the ini- respkcting
tial history of the race; and much account is made of marriage.
the fact by the advocates of this pre-adamite theory. It is a case
in which strong words may be used. Strong words are used.' The
only avoidance of so repugnant a consequence is in the existence
of pre-adamites, with whom the children of Adam might unite in
lawful marriage. Such is the view.
How would Professor Winch ell account for the initial multipli-
cation of the race without the implication which he so question for
strongly reprobates? On his theory, only the coinci- evolutionists.
dent evolution of two human beings, respectively male and female,
could meet the lowest requirement for the inception of a hu-
man race. It might be said that such man and woman, even if
born of the same animal parentage, would hot be brother and sis-
ter, because such a relation has no sufficient ground in such a
parentage. However, their children would be brothers and sisters,
and there would still be no provision for a human race without
their intermarriage. Hence the theory must assume the coincident
evolution of distinct human pairs, and, reasonably, from distinct
animal parentages, so as to provide for marriage without the con-
sanguinity of brother and sister. Such evolutions must be assumed
to be coincident in both time and place; for otherwise their chil-
dren could never meet in wedlock, and the lawful requirements for
a human race would still be wanting. A coincident creation of
distinct human pairs, if such were the divine order, would be en-
tirely responsive to rational thought; but such opportune evolutions
' Winchell : Pre-adamites, pp. 190, 191.
338 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
to meet the exigencies of this pre-adamitism are not responsive to
such thought. It thus appears that this theory has for itself no
escape from the implication which it so strongly rei^els, except
through the most unwarranted assumptions.
The requirement of pre-adamites in order to provide lawful
THE QCESTioN marriage for the children of Adam carries with it
iNKTHNOLooY. scrlous difficultics in the question of ethnology and the
distinctions of race, while the implication so strongly objected
to the Adamic origin of man still cleaves to this theory. On this
theory, the distinctions of race are from separate origins or evolu-
tions, not from differences of environment. Such is the law for
the deeper distinctions of the Negroid, Mongoloid, and Caucasian
races. The Negroid is held to be the oldest. There must be an
oldest, and the case is the same whichever be the race. "We pro-
ceed on the supposition of the Negroid. For a beginning, the ^he-
ory requires the coincident evolution of a Negroid man and woman.
But how shall the race be propagated without the marriage of
brothers and sisters ? There are no pre-negroidites with whom
they might intermarry. If the deeper distinctions of race are orig-
inal, the Negroid must be original, without any mixture of blood
by the marriage of its first family of sons and daughters with an
older race. Otherwise, it is impossible to identify any original
race, and the ethnology of this theory becomes an utter tangle.
Whence the Mongoloid? Some have thought him the mongrel
child of the Negro and the Caucasian. If such be his origin, the
Caucasian race is older than the Mongoloid, while the latter is
clearly of lower grade. Therefore this view is out of accord with
the theory of evolution, which cannot allow the antecedence of a
higher race to a lower. Nor can it agree with many of the alleged
proofs of pre-adamites. Hence Professor Wincheil consistently re-
jects it.' On his OAvn theory of the evolution of distinct races, the
iNTHETFiEORT Mougoloid must be a new type by evolution from the
OF wiNCHELL. Ncgrold stock. How shall the new type be perpet-
uated except by propagation within itself ? If the first offspring
of the newly evolved t3'pe must intermarry with the original stock,
it can have no permanence. But the propagation within itself, as
necessary to its perpetuation as a distinct race, requires the inter-
marriage of brothers and sisters. Adam appears as a ruddy white
man. His origin is by evolution from an older stock, not by direct
creation. He is the beginning of the Caucasian or white race."
How is this new type to be propagated so as to preserve its distinc-
tion as the Caucasian race ? The children of Adam must not inter-
^ Pre-adamites, p. 189. ^Ibid., p. 294.
THE UNITY OF MAN. 389
marry. For its avoidance the pre-adamites must be ou hand. Cain
married a Mongoloid.' Other children of Adam, at least the
earlier, must have done the same. So the theory requires. It is
the union of a very few with a race already numerous. The slight
infusion of white blood will readily be absorbed without any notice-
able or abiding variation of the Mongoloid type. It cannot be so
with the new type. The grandchildren of Adam are half-Mongo-
loid, and each succeeding generation must be still more conformed
to that type. There is here no parentage for the propagation of
the distinct Caucasian race. Nor could there be any distinct Adamic
race.
While such difficulties cleave to this theory, nothing is gained by
thus recasting the traditional interpretation of Script- ^^ ^^^^ ^^
ure. There is in it no avoidance of the special objec- pre-adamit-
tion under review. On the initiation of a human race '^*''
without the intermarriage of brothers and sisters, science sheds not
a ray of light. Hence pre-adamites should not hastily and dogmat-
ically urge such an objection against the primariness of Adam.
Any relief for his family can be gained only at the cost of an
earlier family. On any theory, there must have been a beginning
of mankind ; and at that beginning, whenever placed, such pre-
adamites must find their own objection on hand, and with all its
force against themselves. For purely naturalistic evolutionists the
question has no concern, but for theistic evolutionists it has pro-
found concern ; and it is far better that they should modestly and
reverently leave it with the providence of God. Surely the order-
ing of the matter was wholly within his prerogative. Nor should
we judge the question out of our present feelings. The case may
have been very different in the first family of the race. God may
have given to the sons and daughters of Adam a conjugal cast of
the affectional nature rather than a brotherly and sisterly cast.
On the ground of theism there is no perplexity in such a view. In
the constitution of man nothing is more remarkable than the
adjustment of his affectional nature to his manifold relations.
It is an instance of the purest divine teleology. Nor shall we hes-
itate to believe that in like manner God could easily provide for
any exigency arising in the initial history of the race.
7. Doctrinal Interest in the Question of Unity. — Polygenism,
or an original plurality of races, in whatever form of the the-
ory, is in opposition to fundamental doctrines of Christian theol-
ogy. We instance anthropology and soteriology.
The Adamic origin of mankind ; the sin and fall of the prim-
' Pre-adamites, p. 295.
890 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
itive pair ; the consequent moral lai)se and ruin of the race ; the
redemption of tlie race by Jesus Christ : the inclusion
IN ANTHROPOL- ^ . •' , '
o(iY ANDsoTE- of all mcu in the race so ruined and redeemed — these are
RioLooY. clear truths of Scripture. A few texts will suffice for
the proof. The most explicit is the great passage of St. Paul.' It
affirms the facts of anthropology and soteriology which we summa-
rily stated. Through the sin of Adam all men suffer the consequence
of depravity and death. Then for all men so ruined by the Adamic
fall there is a common redemption in Jesus Christ. There is
another text which, with its profound implications, gives the same
truths : " For since by man came death, by man came also the
resurrection of the dead. For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ
shall all be made alive." ' It thus appears again that the death
of all men is a consequence of Adamic sin, and that for all as so
involved there is a common redemption in Christ.
Neither polygenism in general nor pre-adamitism in particular
NO ADJUST- can adjust itself to these truths of Christian theology.
MENT. Qf course, the attemi)t is made ; but its futility is
easily exposed. How could races existing long before Adam, and
out of all genealogical connection with him, suffer the consequences
of his sin ? Any affirmative answer must assume a retroaction of
Adam's sin. Such retroaction is assumed. The position of Pey-
rerius is thus stated : " Death entered the world before Adam, but
it was in consequence of the imputation 'backward' of Adam's
prospective sin ; and this was necessary, that all men might partake
of the salvation provided in Christ." ' McCausland regards the
pre-adamites as sinners on their own account, and finds in the words
of Paul, not the universality of Adamic sin, but the universality of
the redemption in Christ : "The Saviour redeemed Adam and his
race, as the apostle states ; but the redemption extends from the
highest heaven to the lowest Hades — from Abel, Enoch, and Noah
to 'the spirits in prison,' who were not of Adam's race."* The
equivalence of great facts, as given in the comparison of Paul, is
thus annulled. In this view the redemption in Christ immensely
transcends the extent of Adamic sin and death, while in the sense
of Paul the two are of the same extent.
Professor Winchell's own argument for the consistency of pre-
TiEw OF WIN- adamitism with Christian doctrine is mostly put in
CHELL. certain questions : Why could not antecedent races
share with Noah and Abraham in the plan of salvation ? If the
atonement was retroactive for four thousand years or more, why
' Rom. V, 12-19. 5 1 Cor. xv, 21, 22.
' Winchell : Pre-adamites, p. 458. * Adam and the Adamite, p. 294.
THE UNITY OF MAN. 391
not a few thousand years farther? If it reached Adam, why not his
ancestry? Why should the limitations of Hebrew knowledge limit
the flow of divine grace ? ' These questions might all be answered
in the implied sense of the author, and yet be valueless for the proof
of his theory, because, at most, they could give only the inference
of a possible extension of redemptive grace, while the real question
concerns the actual facts of sin and redemption as given in the
Scriptures.
Professor Winchell gives prominence to certain utterances of
Dr. Wliedon, which, however, were confessedly only whedon's
tentative or hypothetic, and were subsequently with- views.
drawn.'* There was a time when the evidences of a high antiquity
of man seemed to Dr. Whedon very strong, and when he thought
it possible that further disclosures might prove an antiquity beyond
the reach of biblical chronology. In forethought of such a con-
tingency he suggested the admission of pre-adamites as probably
the best mode of adjusting Christian doctrine to such antiquity :
" Why not accept, if need be, the pre-adamic man ? If Dr. Daw-
son admits an Adamic center of creation, why not admit, if pressed,
other centers of human origin ? The record does not seem to deny
other centers in narrating the history of this center. The atone-
ment, as all evangelical theology admits, has a retrospective power.
It provides, as St. Paul says, ' remission for the sins that are past ' —
that is, for those who lived and sinned before Christ died ; and
who received ^ remission ' from God in anticipation of the atone-
ment. It was thus that Abraham was justified by faith, through
the Christ that had not yet made the expiation. The atonement
thus may throw responsibility and propitiation for sin over all past
time, all terrene sections, and all human races. So, too, the sin
of Adam may bring all past misdoings of earlier races under the
category of sin and condemnation — that is, under the inauguration
of a system of retribution which otherwise would not have taken
existence. Some theologians have held that the atonement throws
its sublime influence over other worlds than ours ; why not then
over other human races ? Here, as often elsewhere, science, that
seemed to threaten theology, does but open before it broader fields
and sublimer elevations. It contradicts our narrow interpretations,
and reads into the text worlds of new meaning. With this pro-
visional view we have not the slightest misgiving as to the efi;ect
of the demonstration of the pre-adamite man upon our own the-
ology.""
' Pre-adamites, pp. 285, 286. ■^Ibid., pp. 286-389, 470, 471.
^ Methodist Quarterly Review, 1878, pp. 369, 370.
392 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
We cannot share the confidence of Dr. Whedon in such a mode
NO ADJUST- °^ adjustment, in case the exigency should ever arise.
ME\T IN situ AVe think the mode discredited by the assumptions
A MODK. which it requires. These assumptions were previously
indicated, and now more fully appear in the above citation. One is
the retroaction of Adamic sin; the other, the retroaction of redemp-
tive grace. In both cases the retroaction must be such as to reach
pre-adamic races. In itself considered, the latter assumption in-
volves no serious perplexity. The atonement was in the plan of
God the provisional ground of salvation for the Adamic race from
the beginning, and, on the existence of prior races, might have
been made available for them. So far, however, the putting of the
case is purely hypothetic, while such an extension of redemptive
grace is purely a question of fact. The other assumption of a
retroaction of Adamic sin which brings pre-existent races " under
the category of sin and condemnation " seems to us utterly inad-
missible. The full consequence of Adam's sin upon his own race
in genealogical descent from himself is full of perplexity. With-
out the genealogical connection any such consequence must be
purely arbitrary, and the product of an immediate providential
agency. This implication is not avoidable by a derivative connec-
tion of the Adamic race with earlier races, as held by Professor
Winchell. The reason is obvious. Genealogical relations have no
retroactive jjower. Heredity ever moves forward, never backward.
It remains true that any involvement of earlier races in the sin of
Adam must have been a purely arbitrary determination. Such a
mode of guilt and retribution has no consistency with Christian
theology — certainly none with an Arminian system. With Dr.
Whedon himself, in his final view, we think it better not yet to
accept the pre-adamite, and not to provide for him until his actual
coming.'
The idea of a broader relation of the atonement than to mankind
SCOPE OF THE of tcu appcars in theological discussion. It was easy,
ATONEMENT. thercforc, for Professor Winchell to cite numerous
instances.' Any. service of the idea to the theory of pre-adamites
must depend upon its content. Earely has it been maintained
that the atonement is for other sinners than those of mankind.
MEANiNo OF Wlicu vicwcd as more broadly related, it is simply as
CITATIONS. a fact of paramount interest, as a lesson of profoundest
moral significance, to all intelligences. Such is the whole content
of the idea in its u.sual theological expression. We find notliing
more in the instances cited by Professor Winchell. In most of
' Methodist Quarterly Eevieiv, 1378, p. 567. ' Pre-adamites, pp. 289-293.
THE UNITY OF MAN. 393
them it is beyond question tliat this is all. We read nothing more
in the citations from Bishop Marvin; ' nothing more in that from
Dr. Chalmers.''' Indeed, we know that he meant nothing more.
The citation from Hugh Miller ^ means simply the familiar idea of
an original inclusion of redemption in the divine plan of creation
and providence, without any intimation of an atonement for other
than human sinners. Any further sense of Sir David Brewster
must be a mere inference from an hypothetic interrogation.* With
Professor Winchell we also could heartily appropriate the words
long ago uttered by Bentley: ''^Neither need we be solicitous about
the condition of those planetary people, nor raise frivolous disputes
how far they may participate in Adam's fall, or in the benefits of
Christ's incarnation; " ^ but they shed no light upon this pre-adam-
itism. There is no ground in Scripture for any notion of a retro-
action of sin and grace in the ruin and recovery of pre-adamic
races. Nor can we see how the views of authors, as above stated,
could be thought of any value in the suj)port of such a theory.
1 The Work of Christ, pp. 10, 70, 74, 78, 137.
^ Astronomical Discourses, discourse iv, p. 134.
^Foot-prints of the Creator, p. 326.
* More Worlds than One, English edition, pp. 166, 167.
« Bcyyle Lectures, 1724, p. 298.
394 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
CHAPTER 11.
PRIMITIVE MAN.
The man we here study is tlie man of the Mosaic narrative, not
the first man of evohition. The two are widely different. If man
came by evolution he was in the beginning of brutish mold, and a
savage. It is not proved that man so came.- Nor are we here con-
cerned to review the question of his origin, which we previously
discussed. We begin tlie study of man as presented in the nar-
rative of Moses. In such a study the first question concerns the
narrative itself, whether it should be interpreted according to a
literal sense or be treated as mythical or allegorical. Only in the
former sense can it give us any clear light on the question of prim-
itive man. However, the interpretation must be determined, not by
the exigency of light, but by the evidences in the case. We pre-
viously considered the question respecting the Mosaic narrative of
creation; and as the narrative respecting primitive man is a part
of that broader history it requires the less separate discussion.
I. LiTEKAL Sense of Mosaic Naerative.
1. Historic Style of the Narrative. — When the style is purely
historical the contents must be accepted as literal, unless there be
determining reasons for a different sense. This is a familiar and
fully accepted principle of interj^retation. Murphy states it thus:
"The direct or literal sense of a sentence is the meaning of the
author, when no other is indicated; not any figurative, allegorical,
or mystical meaning."' The law is just as valid for an extended
narrative as for a sentence. The account of primitive man is
clearly historic in style. There is no contrary intimation nor any
thing in the contents to discredit the literal sense. Therefore the
narrative must be accepted as historic. This conclusion cannot
be discredited by rejrarding the narrative simply as the
NOT A PHIL- -^ ". *' , , T
osopiiic SPEC- philosophic speculation of some devout Jew on the
DLATioN. origin of moral evil. Such a view has gained more or
less currency, particularly in German thought. " But we cannot
adopt this hypothesis, for it requires a much later date to be
' On Genesis, pp. 13, 14. For a very full and able treatment of the question
see Holden : The Fall of Man, chap. iii.
PRIMITIVE MAN. 395
assigned to the narrative than the language in which it is written —
allowing the utmost latitude that modern criticism demands —
admits. It would, moreover, be very difficult to understand how
the profound piety of a Jew, in dwelling upon the sacred traditions
of his people concerning the progenitors of the race, could allow
him to represent his theorizings as real history; or how, contrary
to his purpose, such a misapprehension could arise. " '
2. Historical Comiections of the Narrative. — The narrative of
primitive man is not an isolated part of Genesis, but a part thor-
oughly interwoven with its contents. If the facts which compose
the body of the book are historical, so are the facts respecting man.
All have a common ground. Any departure from historic verity
is a surrender of the whole to allegoric uncertainty. " No writer
of true history would mix plain matter of fact with allegory in one
continued narrative, without any intimation of a transition from
one to the other. If, therefore, any part of this narrative be mat-
ter of fact, no i^art is allegorical. On the other hand, if any part
be allegorical, no part is naked matter of fact; and the consequence
of this will be that every thing in every part of the whole narrative
must be allegorical. . . . Thus the whole history of the creation
will be an allegory, of which the real subject is not disclosed; and
in this absurdity the scheme of allegorizing ends.'"' With a simple
historic style, with nothing to discredit an historical sense, with no
intimation of any other, and with such consequences of any depart-
ure from that sense, we must adhere to the true historical charac-
ter of this narrative.
3. Uncertainty of a Figurative Interpretation. — This account
of primitive man must have been intended for the communication
of important truth. In this again it stands in inseparable connec-
tion with the fuller contents of Genesis. One may deny such an
intention for the whole, but only at the cost of reducing the book
to the grade of a mere romance or groundless speculation. The
cost is too great. Nor is there any compensation. The book
itself would become utterly inexplicable. It could have no rational
account as to either its origin or aim. Such a book must have
an aim, and the only rational aim is the communication of impor-
tant truth. With a literal sense such truth is given; without it,
only myth or romance remains.
4. Scripture Recognition of a Literal Sense. — This recognition is
given in clear references to leading events of the narrative. There
' Miiller : Christian Doctrine of Sin, vol. ii, pp. 347, 348.
^ Bishop Horsley : Biblical Criticism, vol. i, p. 9. Cited by Holden : The Fall
of Man, pp. 21, 23.
396 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
is such a reference in the words of our Lord respecting the unity
PROOFS OF TiiK of luisbaud and wife — such a unity as must bar all di-
REcoGNiTioN. vorcemcnt, except for the one reason which he allows.'
The reference is determined beyond question by a citation from
the Mosaic narrative." There could be no reference to such events,
and particularly as the ground of so important a doctrine, without
the reality of the events themselves. Such also is the reference to
the serpent as the instrument in the temptation of Eve.' Another
instance is in the reference to the order of succession in the forma-
tion of Adam and Eve, and also to the facts that the woman was
deceived and first in the transgression." How could these events
be made the ground of such a lesson of economical order unless
they were regarded as real? There are references to still deeper
truths. One is to the introduction of sin and death into the
world by the sin of Adam.' His sin and fall are thus brought into
vital relation to the deepest truths of Christianity. Even the
redemjitive mediation of Christ is conditioned on the reality of
these events. Without as much fullness of statement, there is the
implication of the same deep truths in another reference of Paul."
The historic character of the Mosaic narrative respecting primitive
man thus stands clearly in the recognition of the Scriptures. This
recognition, with the other evidences adduced, is conclusive of a
literal sense.
II. Primary Questions of Mosaic Narrative.
The simple narrative of creation, even from the beginning,
moves on in sublime strain; but when the creation of man is
reached a deeper tone is heard. Up to this stage there is for ra-
tional thought no completeness of nature. The same stars are in
the sky; the same sun illumines the world; there are the same liv-
ing orders, with all the wonders of organic constitution; but there
is no mind within this scale of nature for the rational cognition of
these orderly forms of existence; none which may rise in thought
to a divine Mind as their only true and sufficient original. "Within
their own limitation no sufficient reason for their existence can
be given. Their end is not in themselves.'' This deficiency is
the projihecy of a rational culmination, and the prophecy is fulfilled
in the coming of man. That distinct and deeper tone is first
heard in the narrative of his creation, and signifies his true head-
' Matt, xix, 4-6. ''Gen. ii, 24. »2 Cor. xi, 3.
* 1 Tim. ii, 13, 14. ^Eom. v, 12-19. « 1 Cor. xv, 21, 22.
' Dwiglit : Theology, vol. i, pp. 348, 349 ; "Watson : Theological Institutes,
vol. ii, p. 8.
PRIMITIVE MAN. 397
ship.' Such completion of tlie scale is the satisfaction of rational
thought.
A few particulars of the Mosaic narrative require brief attention
before we come to the deeper questions of doctrinal anthro]Dology.
1. Constituent Natures of Man. — On the face of the sacred nar-
rative there are two distinct natures, body and mind, in the orig-
inal constitution of man. This fact itself decides nothing respect-
ing the theory of trichotomy, but is so far the obvious truth of the
Mosaic narrative. Man is certainly dichotomic. " And the Lokd
God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his
nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul."^ There
must here be the sense of two distinct natures.
The body is material like the earth out of which it is formed. The
chemical elements combined in its constitution belong ^ material
to the same earth. The body can easily be resolved ^^odt.
into these common elements. Such a resolution is in constant
process, as certain particles, having fulfilled their use, are ever be-
ing eliminated, while others are ever taking their place by a proc-
ess of assimilation. While the body possesses all the qualities of
matter, it is subject to the same methods of chemical and mechan-
ical treatment. Its purely material nature is thus at once the clear
sense of the Mosaic narrative and the determination of physical facts.
In the formation of Adam there was no such divine operation as
man must put forth in working a batch of clay into a xo manipula-
human form. There was no divine manipulatmi of '^'^'^^' ^^'OR"^-
material. So crude a notion never entered into any clear theistic
conception. Yet we find such a notion urged as an objection to the
origin of man in an immediate divine formation. " Pre-adamitism
. . . admits that Adam was 'created,^ but substitutes for manual
modeling of the plastic clay the worthier conception of origination
according to oogenetic method."^ Whether put as an objection to
the orthodox conception of man's creation, or as an argument for
h.is evolution, the answer is already given: the crude notion of a
"manual modeling of the plastic clay" never appears in that con-
ception. The divine agency in this case, as in all others, is in the
energizing of the divine will. The immediate formation of primitive
man through this agency is the whole truth of the orthodox theory.
The formation of the body was only a part of the divine work in
the creation of man. There followed the divine in- creation cf
breathing: God "breathed into his nostrils the breath ^"^'^•
of life; and man became a living soul." The body might have
been complete in its organic constitution without the living state,
' Gen. i, 26-28. « Gen. ii, 7. ^ Winchell : Pre-adamites p. 385.
398 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
and tliis divine inbreatliing might primarily signify itsvitalization,
with the inception of respiration as necessary to the maintenance
of life. Some expositors find this lower sense in the jilural form
of the original text, as signifying " the breath of lives." There is,
however, in this distinct view of vitalization a trichotomic impli-
cation which seems mostly to have been overlooked. In the deeper
sense the divine operation must mean the creation of the rational
mind. The divine inbreathing signifies this creative agency.
Ilowever, there is no outward form of action. So far the expres-
sion is anthropomorphic. The deep and true meaning is none the
less clear. There is no impartation of divine essence as constitu-
tive of the human soul. It is an immediate creation in the most
originative sense of the term. This is the deeper meaning of the
divine inbreathing in the creation of man.
Eational mind is the distinction of man as an order of existence.
MIND DisTixcT- Wltliout tlils distiuction he must be classed merely as an
ivE OF MAN. animal. He might still be the highest grade, but could
not be a distinct order. The utmost exaltation, exaggeration even,
of animal intelligence leaves it in an infinitely lower plane than that
of rational mind. The characteristics and achievements of human
intelligence are the sufficient proof. The reality of mind is given
with its faculties. Such faculties must have a ground in being.
The essential distinction of the mind and the body is given in the
profound distinction of qualities. In the one we find the prop-
erties of matter, with their complete subjection to chemical and
mechanical laws; in the other, the faculties of intelligence and
personal agency under a law of freedom. The two classes are in
such thorough distinction, contrariety even, that they cannot have
a common ground in being. Otherwise properties signify nothing
as to the nature of their ground. But if they have no meaning for
its nature, neither have they any for its reality. "We should thus
fall into the most abject phenomenalism or positivism. Reason,
however, still asserts, and will forever assert, the reality of being
as the ground of properties, and equally asserts a distinction of
grounds in accord with the fundamental distinction of properties.
Thus reason affirms the reality of spiritual being as the ground of
mental faculties. Hence the divine inbreathing was the creation of
a si^iritual nature in man.
2. Tlie Question of Triclwtomy. — Trichotomy is the doctrine of
« o„,-„.^„ „„ three distinct natures in man — body, soul, spirit — o^ua,
OBSCrRITT OF ^ ^ .. .
A THIRD NAT- ^pv^i], TTVEvixa, Body and spirit are defined and dis-
^^''" criminated in the same manner as in the dichotomic
view. There is unavoidable indefiniteness respecting the soul when
PRIMITIVE MAN. 399
tlius held as a nature distinct from each of the others. We can
readily define and differentiate material and mental natures by
their respective and essentially different qualities, but we cannot so
treat a nature which is neither, and is without definitive and dif-
ferentiating qualities of its own. Dr. Bush, with others, desig-
nates it as a tertium quid, and assumes to fiud the evidence of its
reality in a set of qualities in man which are neither material nor
mental in any distinctive sense. These qualities appear in what
constitutes the animal life in man in distinction from the intel-
lectual or rational life.^ The use of the indefinite tertium quid
for the designation of this intermediate nature fully concedes its
indefiniteness. Mere indefiniteness, however, is not conclusive
against its reality. A thing is definite as its qualities are open to
our mental cognition, and indefinite when they are not open. With
hidden qualities there might still be the reality of being; though
in such case we could not affirm the being. Whether the qualities
of the animal or sentient life of man require as their ground a ter-
tium quid, a nature neither physical nor mental, is far from self-
evident. It may not be possible to prove the contrary. It follows
that the question of trichotomy cannot be decided in this mode.
In the early history of tlie Church trichotomy flourished mostly
in the school of Alexandria, and was introduced into trkhotomy
Christian theology throiigli the Platonic philosophy. ^'^ theology.
For a while it seemed fairly on the way to a common acceptance,
v/hen adverse influences checked its progress and brought it into
disrepute. Tertullian strongly opposed it, and his influence was
very great. Even the seeming indifference of Augustine was in-
directly much against it; for his influence was so great on all doc-
trinal questions that nothing without his open suj^port could hold
a position of much favor in the more orthodox thought of the
Church. Besides these facts, trichotomy was appropriated in the
interest of the Apollinarian Christology and the Semi-Pelagian doc-
trine of sin. Very naturally, though not very logically, the strong
antagonism to these heresies turned all its force against the tri-
chotomy so appropriated.'^ The doctrinal relation of trichotomy to
these heresies is worthy of brief notice. The pointing out of this
relation requires a statement of the heretical elements of the doc-
trines concerned.
The Christology of Apollinaris denied to Christ the human mind
in its distinct rational sense, and provided for its functions in his
' Bush : Anastasis, p. 78.
" Delitzscli : Biblical Psychology, p. 106 ; McClintock and Strong : CyclO'
pcedia, "Trichotomy."
400 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
personality by tlie presence of the Logos as the divine reason.
IV APOLLiNA- Such a view requires the trichotomic anthropology, for
KiAxisM. the presence of the Logos in the place of the rational
mind could not account for the sensibilities of Christ in the like-
ness of our own. In the absence of the rational mind, tlie soul
must have been present as the ground of the manifold affections
which lie below the purely rational life. Therefore the soul must
be a distinct existence, for otherwise it could not be thus j^resent
in the absence of the rational mind. Such being the facts in the
case, the only relation of trichotomy to the Apollinarian Christol-
ogy is that it is the requirement and the possibility of such a
Christology. On the other hand, this heresy is in no sense the
logical implication or consequence of the trichotomy. Hence,
with entire consistency, many trichotomists are thoroughly ortho-
dox in their Christology. It follows that tliis heretical appropria-
tion of trichotomy is no evidence against its truth, and no reason
for the disrepute which it suffered in consequence.
The Semi-Pelagian doctrine of original sin, while holding much
IV sEMi-PELA- truth as against pure Pelagianism, fell far short of the
GiAxisM. Augustinian doctrine. It specially differed from the
latter, and fell short of it, in excepting the purely si^iritual nature
of man from the effect of Adamic sin. Yet his mere physical
nature could not be the ground of all that was suffered. The soul
as a distinct nature is necessary to such sufficient ground. Hence
it must exist in man as a real nature in distinction from his purely
spiritual nature. It thus appears that trichotomy is related to the
Semi-Pelagian doctrine of sin precisely in the manner of its relation
to the Apollinarian Christology. If the spiritual nature is excepted
from the effect of AdamJc sin, trichotomy must be true because it
is the requirement of facts in the case of such exception. This
exception, however, is no logical implication of the trichotomy.
Hence trichotomy has no direct doctrinal concern with the Semi-
Pelagian doctrine of original sin. Indeed, it does not seriously
concern any important doctrine of Christian theology. It is a
question of speculative interest in biblical ps3'chologT, but has no
doctrinal implications decisive of either its truth or falsity.
A dichotomic view of man is clearly given in the Scriptures.
DICHOTOMY ^® S^^G by reference a few texts out of many.' The
OF THE SCRIPT- dust aud the spirit, body and soul, body and spirit are
^^^'^' the terms of these toxt>, which seem at once inclusive of
the whole man and thoroughly distinctive of his natures. In this
view man is only dichotomic. Yet Ave can hardly regard these texts
' Eccl. xii, 7; Matt, x, 28 ; 1 Cor. vi, 20 ; Jas. ii, 26.
PRIMITIVE MAN. 401
as decisive of the question; and for the reason that, even with an
intermediate nature, the very profound and specially open distinction
between our bodily and spiritual natures justifies their designation
in the same comprehensive sense as if really constitutive of our
whole being. It is not the manner of the sacred writers, as it is
not that of any writer, to be always thoroughly analytic. In the
treatment of subjects it mostly suffices that chief characteristics be
set forth, and the more 2''i"omiuent distinctions be made. Usually
this is the actual and the better method. This may be the method
in these formally dichotomic texts, and hence they are not conclu-
sive against trichotomy.
There are also trichotomic texts — such at least in form. Two are
in special favor with the advocates of trichotomy,^ In trichotomic
the first we have the three distinctive terms '^spirit, and texts.
soul, and body ; " in the other, '^ soul and spirit," with other terms,
** joints and marrow," which clearly sig]iify the body. In this
prayer of Paul for the Christians of Thessalonica the central and
ruling idea is the entireness of their sanctification and their blame-
less preservation therein. With his usual force and fullness of ex-
pression, naturally, in such a case ho Avould use words comprehensive
of the whole man as the subject of the gracious sanctification and
preservation. The intentional meaning of three distinct natures in
man is no necessary part of such comprehension. Indeed, such a
formal analytic view is hardly consistent with the intensity of the
ruling idea of a complete wholeness. Such is the case in the great
commandment.^ With the simple idea of loving God with our
utmost capacity of loving, this commandment receives its greatest
force ; while, on the other hand, it must sulier loss of force by any
analysis of heart, soul, and mind into ontological distinctions. The
other text is open to similar observations. Soul and spirit are here
viewed, not as essentially distinct, but as together the seat of
thought and affection. In this view a third term, heart, has the
same meaning as the other two. As the word of God is quick and
sharp, and pierces even to the sundering of soul and spirit, so it
comes to discern the thoughts and intents of the heart. This sub-
stitution of the one term heart for the two terms soul and spirit
denies to them any ontological distinction ; for otherwise we must
allow a third distinction for the heart, and the three, with the body,
would give us a tetrachotomous division of natures in man. Such
an outcome would itself be fatal to trichotomy.
If the original terms, C'SJ and 'ipvx'ij, on the one hand, and nil
and TTvsvim, on the other, were used with uniformity of discrimina-
' 1 Thess. V, 23 ; Heb. iv, 12. = Luke x. 27.
27
402 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
tion, the former for tlie ground of the animal life and the latter for
USE OP oRiGi- ^hc ground of the rational and religious life, the fact
NAL TERMS. wouM constitutc a strong argument for trichotomy.
Such, however, is not the case. Indeed, the contrary is the fact.
The former two often signify the ground of the rational life, wliile
the latter two often signify the ground of the animal life. A few ref-
erences may sufifice for the verification of this position.
TEiE HKitKKw . -yy^ ^j^.^ ^j^^ leading meanings of t:*SJ : Life ; ' life or
spirit ; ■ intellect, as manifest in its predicates or functions : joyful
love ; ^ gladness ; * piety toward God ; ' sinning ; " faculty of knowl-
edge ; ' the personal self.® It is thus made clear that this term has
no restricted lower sense which can serve the interest of trichotomy,
hut is freely used in the highest sense of personal mind. We find
the same meanings in the use of nn : breath; ■' animal life ; '" the one
life and spirit respectively of man and beast ; " the intellect, un-
derstanding; '■ the immortal spirit.''' It thus appears that, while
the former term rises to the highest sense of the latter, the latter
sinks to the lowest sense of the former. This absence of all dis-
tinction in their application to the animal and rational sides of
human life denies to their use any support of trichotomy. It Avill
not be questioned that nveviia often signifies the highest
nature of man. Instances of such use are many and
clear. "With the spirit we rejoice in God our Saviour." Our spirit
witnesses jointly with the Holy Spirit to our gracious sonship.'*
The glorified saints are spirits made perfect.'® Only as the personal
mind can the irvevfia be the subject of such predications. This
same term, however, means breath or breathed air ; '^ also the wind.'*
On the other hand, V^v;^;// rises to the highest meaning of Trvei'i^ia.
The soul is the man, the personal self." With the soul we must
love God supremely,'" which is the highest form of personal action.
The martyrs already with God are souls. ^^ We thus find a concur-
rence of meanings in the Scripture use of soul and spirit which pre-
cludes any essential distinction between them.
It was previously stated that a uniform distinction of Hebrew and
Greek terms for the designation of the animal and the rational life of
' Gen. i, 20, 30. «Gen. xxxv, 18 ; 1 Kings xvii, 21.
^Isa, xlii, 1. " Psa. Ixxxvi, 4. ' Psa. ciii, 1, 2.
* Lev. iv, 2. ' Psa. cxxxix, 14 ; Prov. xix, 2,
>" Lev. V, 1, 2, 4, 15, 17 ; Job ix, 21 ; Psa. iii, 2 ; Isa. li, 23. » Job iv, 9.
'"Job xii, 10. " Eccl. iii, 19, 21. '* Isa. xxix, 24. '^Eccl. xii, 7.
" Luke i, 47. '^ Rom. viii, 16. '« Heb. xii, 23. " 2 Thess. ii, 8.
'« John iii, 8. '» Aois ii, 43 ; iii, 23 ; Eom. ii, 9. ^^'Matt. xxii, 37.
*' Eev. vi, 9 ; xx, 4.
PRIMITIVE MAN. 403
man would constitute a strong argument for trichotomy. In the
total absence of such discrimination there is no such argu- ^o support of
ment. On the other hand, the indiscriminate and inter- trichotomy.
changing use of these terms may fairly be claimed as an argument for
the dichotomic view of man. We do not think it conclusive. It fol-
lows that we have reached no dogmatic conclusion on the question of
trichotomy. We are not concerned for the attainment of such a re-
sult, and for the reason previously stated, that the question does not
seriously concern any important truth of Christian theology.'
3. Original Physiological Constitution. — This question must be
determined in the light of relative facts as given in the Scriptures.
In this view it is clearly seen that in chemical elements, in physio-
logical constitution, and in the provision for subsistence, the body
of Adam was much like our own. There must have been lungs for
respiration, an alimentary system for the digestion and assimilation
of food, an organism of veins for the circulation of the blood, and
of nerves for sensation and locomotion. With these facts there
must have been the same osteological and muscular systems.
It is a pure gratuity to think that such a body could be naturally
exempt from the susceptibilities and liabilities of our natural lia-
own. With the highest degree of bodily perfection in bh-itiks.
Adam, he must still have been naturally liable to the ordinary
casualties of our physical life. His bones could be broken, his
blood poisoned, his flesh suffer lesion. He would have suffered
from any excess of either fasting or eating. Such a bodily constitu-
tion is naturally liable to suffering and death. Any exemption in
either case must depend upon a specially providential economy. Such
an exemption was no doubt available for Adam on the condition of
obedience to the divine will. In accord with these views suffering
and death are accounted to man through the sin of disobedience.''
4. Intellectual Grade of Primitive Man. — Here again the truth
is to be sought in a rational interpretation of relative exaggerated
facts. The popular view has been molded rather by the views.
extravagance of Milton than by the moderation of Moses. The the-
ological mind has not been free from much exaggeration. "An
Aristotle was but the rubbish of an Adam."^ In this manner the
vigorous South expresses his lofty conception of the mental endow-
ments of primitive man. Mr. Wesley is not less extravagant in
his view, that Adam reasoned with unerring accuracy — if he rea-
soned at all. The supposition is that he possessed the faculties of
' Heard : Tripartite Nature of Man ; Beck : Biblical Psychology ; Delitzsch :
System of Biblical Psychology, pp. 103-119.
' Gen. ii, 17 ; Eom. v, 12. ^ South : Sermons, vol. i, p. 25.
404 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
immediate insiglit into all subjects, and was in no need of either
experience or reasoning as a means of knowledge. No doubt he
possessed a facult}' of immediate insight into primary truths, but
there is no evidence of any such insight into truths which we can
acquire only through experience and reasoning. We may concede
him a very high grade of mental powers, yet they were merely human,
just like our own in kind, and operative under the same laws.
There is nothing in the naming of the animals which, on any
NAMING THE propcr intcrprctatiou, contradicts this moderate view of
ANIMALS. Adam's mental powers.' The perplexity of this case
need not be aggravated by the assumption of an absolute universal-
ity in the term which designates the number of animals brought to
Adam for naming. " The Hebrew word ^3, Jcol, it is well known,
does not invariably mean all in the largest sense, but sometimes
many or mtich ; and that it was designed to be received with
some limitation in the instance under review is evident from the
fishes of the sea not being specified, and from the inutility of mak-
ing a vocabulary of such animals as were to inhabit distant regions
of the globe, and which Adam would never see again after his nom-
ination of them. It is also uncertain whether the assemblage
consisted of those only which Avere within the precincts of the
garden of Eden, or included others ; inasmuch as the expressions,
' every beast of the field, and every fowl of the air,' may only denote
of the field and climr.te of Paradise."'^ Another mode of limitation
may be cited, wliicli obviates the chief objection urged against the
narrative when taken in a universal sense : "It will be more satis-
factory, however, if it can be shown that the objection rests only on
a misapprehension of the narrative, which by no means affirms that
all the creatures, or even many of them, were congregated before the
man. ' Out of the ground the Lord God formed every beast of tlie
field, and fowl of the air,* and 'ironght to the man,' not 'brought
them,'' as in the English version, but 'brought to the man,* which is
evidently equivalent to hrought of them, the universal every referring
only to the formation. Should it, however, be objected that the next
verse adds, ' the man gave names to all cattle,' etc., this will admit of
easy explanation, for the correct rendering of the passage is, ' to all
tJiG cattle,' evidently to as many as were thus brought before him." '
AVith this restricted sense, however, the naming of the animals
BY NO NAT- remains much the same as it respects the original fac-
uRAi, AniLiTY. xiities of Adam. The names given might be viewed
either as arbitrary or as descriptive. In the former case they
' Gen. ii, 19, 20. • Holden : Tlie Fall of Man, pp. 98, 99.
*Macdonald : Creation and the Fall, -p. 367.
PRIMITIVE MAN. 405
would signify nothing respecting the nature of the animals, while
in the latter case they would express severally the natures of the
different classes. For an arbitrary naming the requirements
would be simply a sufficient vocabulary and a ready use of words.
Adam could have had no such qualifications through his faculties,
unless we postpone this event for many years after his crea-
tion. Language is not gained by intuition. The ready use of
words in articulate speech is gained only through long practice.
What Adam might have done through divine inspiration is a ques-
tion quite apart from the present one which concerns his own
capacities. By common agreement of the best thinkers the orig-
ination of language is a difficult problem ; and not a few have
found its sufficient source only in the divine agency.' It was sim-
ply impossible for Adam in the mere exercise of his own faculties
to acquire almost instantly the vocabulary and the use of words
necessary to the naming of the animals, however much we may
restrict their number. In the view of descriptive names, all the
previous difficulty, as it respects the natural ability of Adam, re-
mains, while very much is added. The giving of such names
required an insight into the nature of the various ^q superhc-
animals. Such an immediate insight has been freely ^''^^ in-sight.
attributed to Adam. "We give a siugio instance : " Adam gave
names; but how? From an intimate knovv^ledge of the nature
and properties of each creature. Here we see the perfection of
his knowledge ; for it is well known that the names affixed to
the different animals in Scripture always express some prominent
feature and essential characteristic of the creatures to which they
are applied. Had he not possessed an intuitive knowledge of the
grand and distinguishing properties of those animals he never
could have given them such names." ^ It is hardly thinkable that
such intuition can belong to any finite mind. To attribute it to
Adam is to jDlace him out of all proper homogeneity with ourselves.
It must mean that the highest and most distinctive power of primi-
tive man is entirely lost to his race. There is no such original
unlikeness, no such loss of original faculty; and it is far more con-
sistent with all the relative facts to account this naming of the
animals to a divine inspiration. '^ To suppose it otherwise, and to
imagine that Adam at the first was able to impose names on the
several tribes of animals, is to suppose, either that he must from the
first have been able to distinguish them by their characteristic
marks and leading properties, and to have distinct notions of them
annexed to their several appellations, or that he applied sounds, at
^ Magee : On the Atoiiement, dissertation liii. - Clarke : Coinr.ientari/, in loc.
406 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
random, an names of the animals, without the intervention of such
notions. But the latter is to suppose a jargon, not a language;
and the former implies a miraculous operation on tlie mind of
Adam, which differs nothing in substance from the divine instruc-
tion here contended for.'"
We thus find in Adam no evidence of a superhuman mental
grade. However high his intellectual powers, they were not other
in kind than our own ; and, if left to himself, his progress, even in
the rudiments of empirical knowledge, must have been very slow.
There is no evidence that he was so left; and it is far more rational
to think that he was divinely instructed and helped forward, that
he might the sooner be prepared for tlie throne of the world assigned
him.*
5. Created in the Image of God. — In the divine ideal of man as
a purposed creation he was to be the image of God. " And God
eaid. Let us make man in our image, after our likeness."' The
record of such an actual creation immediately follows."
Very naturally differences of opinion respecting the likeness of
man to God early appeared in Christian thought.
VIEWS OF HIS J ir 1 • in .1
LIKENESS TO With a commou agreement that man himseli was the
^^^' image of God, there was still the cardinal question as
to what really constituted man. Some could not dispense with the
body as an essential part, and therefore assumed for it a likeness to
God. This required the assumption of some form of corporeity in
God; for it is not to be thought that a physical nature can bear the
likeness of a purely spiritual being. With the burden of such an
assumption, the notion of a bodily similitude could not command a
wide acceptance ; and the prevalent opinion placed the image of
God in the spiritual nature of man. Oi^inions also divided on the
question whether image and likeness, or the original words so ren-
dered, have different meanings or only serve conjunctly to intensify
the expression of the one truth. Occasion was found for a distinc-
tion of meanings. "As there is a great difference between the
mere natural dispositions and their development by the free use of
the powers which have been granted to men, several writers, among
whom Irenoinfi, and especially Clement and Origen, distinguisbed
between the image of God and resemblance to God. The latter
can only be obtained by a mental conflict (in an etliical point of
view), or is bestowed upon man as a gift of sovereign mercy by
union with Christ (in a religious aspect)." ' Such a view is utterly
' Magee : On the Atonement, dissertation liii.
» Gen. i, 26-28. » Gen. i, 26. •• Gen. i, 27.
^Hagenbach : History of Doctrines, vol. i, p. 157.
PRIMITIVE MAN. 407
discredited by the fact that this likeness of man to God was an
original creation, not any subsequent attainment through either
the free agency of man or the sovereignty of divine grace. A dis-
tinction of meanings in the two original terms is again discredited
by the fact that in other places only one is used, sometimes one
and sometimes the other, and in a manner to give to each the full
meaning of both in the primary instance of their conjunct use.'
It should be distinctly noted, and the fact should be emphasized,
that man was originally made in the image of God. Hence things ex-
this image must lie in what he was originally, just as he cluded.
came from the creative hand of God. We thus exclude every thing
extraneous to the man himself, and equally every thing subsequent
to his creation, whether from the divine agency or as the fruit of
his own action. We thus exclude the dominion assigned to man,^
which has often been set forth as the great fact of his likeness to
God. Man was constituted in himself, not in his dominion, the
image of God himself, not of his dominion. His dominion was an
assignment subsequent to his creation in the image of God, which
image constituted his fitness for such dominion.
We may find the true sense of this image rather in a complex of
facts than in a single fact. The spiritual nature of man p^^is of the
is the deepest fact of this likeness — the deepest because likeness.
necessary to all other facts of likeness. But we should not place it
so deep that it shall stand related to the divine likeness in man
Just as the canvas is related to the painting which it bears, or
merely " as precious ground on which the image of God might be
drawn, and formed.^' ^ The spiritual nature was itself of the original
likeness of man to God. Ontologically, spirit is like spirit, though
one be finite and the other infinite. The intellectual and moral
endowments of primitive man constituted a measure of his likeness
to God. Again we are face to face with the profound distinction
between the finite and the infinite; but such distinction does not
preclude a profound truth of likeness. In God there is an intel-
lectual, an emotional, and a moral nature. Such qualities of
nature were in primitive man; in these facts he was the image of
God. Personality is the central truth of man's original likeness to
God. As a person he was thoroughly differentiated from all lower
orders of existence, and in the highest sense lifted up into the
image of God.
The original image of God in man no doubt had the implicit
sense of holiness. Hence in the New Testament it came to signify
' Compare Gen. i, 27 ; v, 1 ; ix, 6. ^ Gen. i, 28.
' Witsius : The Covenants, vol. i, p. 34.
408 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY,
lioliness. This appears in tlie fact that the regeneration of man,
his transformation from depravity into holiness, is represented as a
recreation in tlie image of God after which he was originally made.'
But this question of primitive holiness so deeply concerns important
doctrinal issues that it requires a separate treatment.
' Eph. iv, 34 ; Col. iii, 10.
PRIMITIVE HOLINESS, 409
CHAPTER III.
QUESTION OF PRIMITIVE HOLINESS,
As previously noted, this question deeply concerns important
doctrinal issues. The Pelagian anthropology, with its manifold
doctrinal implications, takes its place on the one side; the Augus-
tinian anthropology, with all its implications, takes its j)lace on the
other. The profoundest dissent from the former does not require
the full acceptance of the latter. It is true that any doctrinal an-
thropology which may be scientifically wrought into a system of
evangelical theology must be in open issue with the Pelagian an-
thropology; but there is sure ground for such a theology without
the extremes of the Augustinian anthropology.
I. Natuee of HoLi]srEss i:?? Adam.
1. Determining Law of Limitation. — Holiness is here viewed a&
a primitive quality of Adam, such as he possessed in the beginning
of his existence. Therefore it must have been simply a quality of
his nature, or such as might be an accompanying gift of his crea-
tion. It certainly could possess no proper ethical element, such as
can arise only from free personal action. This is a determining
law of limitation respecting the nature of primitive holiness. To
pass this limit is to fall at once into the error of thinking that an
ethical holiness may be divinely created in man. Directly follow-
ing this is the error of thinking that a mere nature, the nature
with which we are born, can be the subject of an ethical sinfulness
and demerit — just such sinfulness and demerit as arise from per-
sonal violations of the divine law. An observance of this law of
limitation will protect us against such errors.
3. Fundamental Distinctions of Holiness. — In a true godly life,
such as that of Daniel, in a true Christian life, such as that of
Paul, there is personal holiness, the holiness of character, with the
ethical qualities of righteous action. Such holiness has ethical
worth before the divine law. The quality of holiness and the
moral worth arise from free moral action in obedience to the divine
will.
In such a godly or Christian life there is an inner life answer-
ing to the outer; an inner life of holy aspirations and aims, which
410 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
indeed are the inspiration and true worth of the outer life. But in
these iuner activities there is still the free use of personal faculties,
and therefore the truest form of ethical action. The holiness of
such an inner life is of the truest ethical character, and therein
profoundly different from the possible holiness of a primitive
nature.
Below this inner life there is the nature, with its spontaneous
tendencies. As matter has its properties, so mind has
THE NATURE _ . .
BELOW THE Its powcrs aud tendencies. However metaphysical the
^^^^' distinction between the nature and its tendencies, it is
yet real for thought. Tendencies of nature are specially exempli-
fied in the animal orders. The natural disposition is the determin-
ing law of the animal life. The distinctions of life are from dif-
ferences of natural tendency. AA^e thus note, at once, the reality
and the differences of natural tendency in the lion and the lamb.
In like manner we may note the reality, and the differences, of
natural tendency in men whose lives are morally opposite. With
the one the spontaneous disjiosition is to the good; with the other,
to the evil. Such is the difference between a regenerate or sancti-
fied nature and a nature yet corrupt and vicious. We thus find
differences of moral tendency. On the ground of moral tendency
we allege a moral quality of the nature; on the differences of such
tendency, we qualify the one nature as good and the other as evil,
but only in the sense in which a nature may be good or evil. With
a spontaneous disposition to the good the nature is holy. There is
such a subjective holiness in distinction from all holiness really
ethical in its character.
3. Nature of Adainic Holiness. — After the previous analysis, the
truth in this question is close at hand. The holiness of Adam, as
newly created and before any personal action of his own, was sim-
A SUBJECTIVE P^J ^ subjcctlve state and tendency in harmony with
STATE. iiis moral relations and duties. But such a state, how-
ever real and excellent, and however pleasing to the divine mind,
could not have any true ethical quality, or in any proj^er sense
be accounted either meritorious or rewardable. A deeper analysis
which reaches the most determinate moral principles must eliminate
from theology the ideas of ethical character without free personal
action.
This question should not be confused by any difficulty, or ina-
NOT STRICTLY blHty cvcu, to fix the exact line where spontaneous tend-
ETHicAL. ency passes over into ethical action. Nor should this
line be ignored in order to place such quality in something back of
it. Theological speculation is not free from such mistakes.
PRIMITIVE HOLINESS. 411
'^ Adam was brought into existence capable of acting immedi-
ately, as a moral agent, and therefore he was immedi- the view of
ately under a rule of i^ight action; he was obliged as kdwards.
soon as he existed to act right. And if he was obliged to act right
as soon as he existed, he was obliged even then to be inclined to act
right. . . . And as he was obliged to act right from the first mo-
ment of his existence, and did do so till he sinned in the affair of
the forbidden fruit, he must have had an inclination or disposition of
heart to do right the first moment of his existence; and that is the
same as to be created or brought into existence, with an inclina-
tion, or, which is the same thing, a virtuous and holy disposition of
heart." ' Not only is there here an overlooking of all distinction
between purely sj)ontaneous tendency and proper ethical action, but
it is attempted to prove an original ethical holiness of Adam from
its necessity to the moral obligation which was instant upon his
existence. The assumption of such instant obligation is a pure
gratuity. The requisite knowledge was not a product of the
divine action which gave existence to Adam. Even the gift of ma-
ture powers is not the gift of such knowledge. Whether he was at
once so endowed, or placed under training and gradually inducted
into the moral sphere, we do not know. On these questions the
Scriptures are silent. Eeasonably, there was sufficient time for the
knowledge and sensibility necessary to moral obligation. The as-
sumption of an active disposition so instant upon the very exist-
ence of man as to be beforehand with an instant obligation, and
not only the same in ethical quality as a free moral act, but a ne-
cessity to any holy volition, is far more replete with metaphysical
subtlety than psychological and ethical analysis. The profound
distinction between mere spontaneous tendency and personal action
under obligation and law still remains. It is as real as the deepest
ethical principles. It is none the less real for any inability to fix
the exact line of distinction, xi mere initial tendency to the good
in Adam could have no ethical character. It could not become an
active disposition until duty in some form was j)resented. Simply
as spontaneously active it could constitute only a motive, not an
ethical action. Else to be tempted is to sin, and in every instance
of temptation. Motive, whether to the good or the evil, takes on
ethical character only where approved or entertained. Here it is
that personal agency comes into action. Previous to this there is
no ethical character, and the subtleties of Edwards are futile for
the proof of the contrary.''
' Edwards : Works, vol. ii, p. 385.
2 Full argument of Edwards : Works, vol. ii, pp. 381-390.
412 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
Both Whcdon and Bledsoe very fully and very ably discuss the
principles of this question, and both conclude against
VIEW OK WIIK- ^ '■ . . ^ "
DONANDBLKD- thc possibillty of any moral character, such as involves
^^''" either merit or demerit, previous to free moral action.'
The api3lication of these principles to the present question is in
this manner: '' AVe may suppose a being, like Adam, created with
soul perfectly right. His preferential feelings anterior to action
accord with the divine law. His sensibilities are so under easy
volitional control, his mind is so clear and pure, that all in its
in-imitive undisturbed state is right. His will is able to hold his
whole being in subordination to the moral imperative. He is, in
his grade of being, perfectly excellent; and his excellence is not
mechanical merely or festhetical, but ethical. It is moral excel-
lence; it is created moral excellence, and perfect in its kind, yet
wholly unmeritorious." ^
A primitive Adamic holiness is not an impossibility because
Adam could not, simply as created, be holy in any strictly ethical
or meritorious sense. In the fundamental distinctions of holi-
ness we found a sense which is applicable to a nature in distinc-
tion from a personal agent. It lies in a spontaneous tendency to
the good. The subjective disposition answers to the good on its
presentation. It answers as a spontaneous inclination or imjiulse
toward holy action. This is all that we mean by the nature of
Adamic or primitive holiness.
4. Possibility of Holiness in Adam. — There may be holiness of
the moral nature previous to free moral action. If not, such a
quality of the nature must forever be impossible. Whatever it
might become by good conduct, such it might be constituted in its
original creation. This must be clear if we still hold in view the
fundamental distinctions of holiness. In ethical character we be-
come by free personal action what we could not be constituted by
the divine agency. Only in the former mode can moral merit or
demerit arise. The case is different respecting the nature in dis-
tinction from the personal agent. Whatever quality the nature
might possess subsequent to holy action, or as consequent to such
action, with such quality it could be originally endowed. Other-
wise all moral quality must arise from personal conduct, and must
belong to man as a personal agent, without any i^ossible applica-
tion to his nature.
It would follow that moral beings, however opposite their lives,
' Wheuon : Freedom of the Will, pp. 375-396 ; Bledsoe : Theudicxj, pp. 113- •
I'il.
- Whedon : Freedom of the Will, p. 391.
PRi:\IITIYE HOLINESS. 413
differ only iu deeds, not at all in their natures. Some may love
and worship God, while others blaspheme and hate, but real differ-
Buch is the only difference between them. Nero may jior"^i,°t-
be cruel and vile, and Paul consecrated to the best and ure.
noblest life, but they are without any difference in subjective
quality. There cannot be any difference in respect to holiness,
because such quality can have no place in the nature. Under
such a law even God could not be holy in his nature. A theory
with such implications must be false. With opposite habits of
moral life there must be a difference of natures. In the one case
the spontaneous tendency is to the good; in the other, to the evil.
The tendency to the good we call subjective holiness — holiness of
the nature in distinction from holiness of the life. With such a
nature Adam could be created.
The determining principle of this question is clearly given in
the words of our Lord: "^'Either make the tree good, the tree and
and his fruit good; or else make the tree corrupt, and its fruit.
his fruit corrupt: for the tree is known by his fruit."' In dis-
tinction from the fruit the tree has a quality in itself, for other-
wise the quality of the tree could not determine the quality of the
fruit. ]S!"or could there be any meaning in making the tree good
and its fruit good, or the tree corrupt and its fruit corrupt. Eor
the common intelligence, and for the most critical as well, there is
very real meaning in such facts. We know the quality of a tree by
the quality of its fruit. The principle is the same in the case of
man. Tliis indeed is the meaning and application of these words
of the Master. The deeds of men, as good or evil, answer to their
moral nature and express its quality as good or evil, just as in the
case of the fruit and the tree. The same idea of a moral quality
of our nature is present in many texts which set forth the facts of
regeneration. The transformation of the life is through a renewal
of the moral nature. That renovation of the nature is a moral puri-
fication, and imparts to it a quality of holiness.' It thus appears
that the question of primitive holiness is not a merely speculative
one, but one which vitally concerns the deepest truth and reality of
regeneration. If there be no moral quality of our nature regenera-
tion loses its meaning for the Christian life. Its profound reality
carries with it the reality of such a quality. Hence Adam as newly
created could be holy in his nature.
' Matt, xii, 33.
2 psa li^ 7^ 10 ; Ezek. xxxvi, 25-27 ; 2 Cor. v, 17 ; Gal. vi, 15 ; Eph. iv,
23-24 ; Col. iii, 9, 10.
lU SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
II. Proofs of Primitive Holiness.
1. Implication of the Moral Nature. — Man is a moral being,
and was so constituted in the beginning. Conscience, and moral
reason, and the sense of God and duty are no mere acquisition
tlirough a process of evolution or the association of ideas, but are as
original to man as intelligence and sensibility. Without a moral
nature man is not man. Such a nature must have
TKNDKNCIKSOF
A MORAL NAT- moral tendencies. The notion of its indifference as
^^^' between the ethically good and evil is irrational, and
contradictory to all relative and analogous facts. Mind is sponta-
neously active. The sensibilities which so wonderfully adjust us to
our manifold relations are thus active. This activity is in the form
of tendency or disposition, of inclination or aversion. There is
either an outgoing of the sensibility toward its appropriate object
or an aversion from it, and the notion of indifference is excluded.
There is no indifference as to society, or country, or kindred, or
home. In such objects there is a spontaneous interest. There may
be instances of repugnance or aversion ; but there are none of in-
difference. What is thus true of the sensibilities in general is
equally true of the moral nature. It must be either spontaneously
disposed to the good or inclined to the evil. The facts of observa-
tion and experience affirm the truth of this position. A state of
indifference would betray an abnormal condition. What is thus
TENDENCIES IN ^vcr truc of man was equally true of Adam in his prim-
ADAM. itive state. There were spontaneous tendencies or incli-
nations of his moral nature. But the new Adam was just what God
made him. Ilis spontaneous tendencies were immediately consequent
to his nature as divinely constituted. Hence his moral inclination
must have been to the good in preference to the evil. Such inclination
is at once the characteristic fact and the proof of subjective holiness.
2. Primitive Man Very Good. — That primitive man was very
good is more than an implicit fact of the Mosaic narrative. "And
God saw every thing that he had made, and, behold, it was very
good."' It is true that these words are general, and are not
specifically applied to man, as in other instances like words were
so applied to other parts of the new creation ; " but, as they im-
mediately follow the account of the creation of man, they must as
really and fully apply to him as they could in the most direct and
specific manner. Any limitation, therefore, which excludes the
moral nature of man from this application is contrary to the clear
sense of Scripture.
' Gen. i, 31. » Gen. i, 10, 12, 18, 31, 25.
PRIMITIVE HOLINESS. 415
Yet such a limitation is assumed : " Aud as to the divine declara-
tion that 'every thing was very good/ it expressly a contrary
refers to all that God had made, and is quite compatible '^"^^'•
with the idea of a germ of sin lying hid in man, and having its
origin only in man and not in God. It is also plain that the dec-
laration refers to God's non-intelligent creation as well as to man,
so that it expresses the general fitness of every thing for the purpose
designed, and not moral good." ' Only in this way could the author
attempt a reconciliation of his theory of a germ of sin in primitive
man with his divine characterization as very good ; but no such
reconciliation is possible. We cannot thus turn away from a specific
sense of "very good" to a general sense which shall exclude moral
good in the case of primitive man. Every part of creation has its
purpose after its own kind, and, if fitted to its purpose, good in hi3
must be good in its kind. Miiller really admits this kind.
principle ; and it must be just as true in the case of primitive man
as in ajoplication to any other part of creation. But man was mor-
ally constituted, and divinely purposed for moral ends. God created
man for communion with himself, and for blessedness in his own
holy service. If originally good, he must have been morally good,
for only therein could he have been good in his kind, and fitted for
such divine ends. We could as well omit the luminosity of the sun
from its characterization as " very good " as to omit the morally
good from a like characterization of primitive man.
3. Further Scripture Proofs. — Under this head we present a few
texts which clearly contain the truth of a primitive holiness.
" Lo, this only have I found, that God hath made man upright ;
but they have sought out many inventions."' The ^j^^, ^,^^5
service of the text for the present question hinges upon upright.
the sense of upright. In the frequent use of this term three senses
appear : rectitude of posture or form ; rectitude of conduct ; recti-
tude of the moral nature. The first can have no place in the present
text. The context is a disquisition upon man purely in his moral
aspects, not at all in his organic structure. The evil inventions of
men, so sharply contrasted with an original uprightness, can have
no such distinction from a mere bodily rectitude. The second
meaning — rectitude of conduct — is more than the term can here
admit. In making man upright God did not make for him an
upright life. As previously shown, such a life requires man's own
personal agency. It thus appears that neither the first nor the sec-
ond meaning gives the proper sense of upright in the present text.
A third sense remains, and must be the true one. The term has a
' Miiller : Christian Doctrine of Sin, vol. ii, p. 350. - Eccl. vii, 29.
416 SYSTEMATIC TFIEOLOGY.
deeper meaning than the deeds of an upright life. It reaches down
to the personal agent, and to the principles which underlie his
action. Thus the moral nature with its spontaneous tendencies is
reached. Such is the deeper meaning of upright in its application
to God." Such, too, is its deeper sense in application to man."
This is the proper meaning in the text under treatment. In such
a sense man was originally constituted holy.
" And that ye put on the new man, which after God is created
HOLINESS OF ^^ riglitcousness and true holiness.'' ''And have put
THE NEW MAN. ou tlic ucw mau, which is renewed in knowledge after
the image of him that created him."' These texts are so much
alike that we may properly place them together. We require only
the points which concern the question of primitive holiness. The
central truth of the texts is the transformation of man from an evil
to a good life. This transformation is deeper than the life of per-
sonal action, and includes a renovation of the moral nature. The
old man with his deeds, which must be put off, is both a corrupt
nature and a vicious life ; and the new man, which must be put on,
is both a holy nature and a good life. Hence it is that this moral
transformation requires a renewal in the sj^irit of the mind and a
creation of the new man. Here is an inner work of tlie Holy Spirit,
a purification of the moral nature by his gracious and mighty
agency. This purification is a renewal of the soul in the image of
God in which man was originally created. Clearly this is the
thought in the mind of Paul. His words more than imply it.
The fact of such a thought is not in the least discredited by the
use of words — such as righteousness and knowledge — which carry
a sense beyond the moral nature into the actual life. No exact
parallelism is attempted. With an intense practical aim, the apos-
tle connects with the inner purification the good life which should
spring from it ; but it is still true to his thought that this inner
purification is a renewal of the soul in the original image of God.
Hence in that imago there is the truth of a jDrimitive holinccs.
4. Error of Pelagianism. — In the great contention between
pELAGius AND Augustiuc aud Pelagius, each went to an extreme : the
AUGusTiNK. former in the maintenance of original sin in the sense
of native demerit ; the latter in the denial of native depravity.
Both failed to make the proper distinction between moral character
from personal conduct and the subjective moral state. With an
omission of the proper analysis, such as we have previously given,
' Deut. xxxii, 4 ; Psa. xxv, 8 ; xcii, 15.
''Job i, 1, 8; xxiii, 7; Psa. xi, 7; xxxvii, 37.
3 Epli. iv, 24 ; Col. iii, 10.
PRIMITIVE HOLINESS. 417
to bring out the clear distinction of tlie two, native depravity was
with Augustine native sin and demerit. On the other hand, Pela-
gius,^ equally overlooking that distinction, and holding the impossi-
bility of demerit without one's own personal conduct, denied the
truth of native depravity. With the proper analysis, the former
might have maintained the whole truth of native depravity without
the element of sinful demerit ; while the latter might have held the
same truth of depravity, and yet have maintained his fundamental
principle, that free personal conduct absolutely conditions all sinful
demerit. We thus point out the opposite extremes, and the oppo-
site errors, of the two parties in this great contention.
Other errors followed in logical consistency. If all men might be
sinners, with the desert of punishment, by virtue of an inherited
depravity, Adam could have the moral worth and rewardableness of
an eminent saint simply by virtue of an original creation. The
anthropology of Augustine both with himself and his many follow-
ers tends strongly to this view. On the other hand, errors op
the denial of primitive holiness on the part of Pelagius pelagius.
was logically consequent to his denial of Augustine's doctrine of
original sin. Failing to analyze this doctrine into its separate ele-
ments, his denial of native sin carried with it the denial of native
depravity. On such a principle there can be no moral qualiiby of a
nature, and therefore no primitive holiness. This was the outcome
witli Pelagius, as may be seen in his own words. " From the first
book of Pelagius on free-will, Augustine quotes the following dec-
laration of his opponent {De Pec. Orig., 13) : 'All good and evil,
by which we are praise or blameworthy, do not originate together
with us, but are done by us. We are born capable of each, but not
filled with either. And as we are produced without virtue, so are
we also without vice ; and before the action of his own will, there is
in man only what God made. ' " ' This denies all change in the
moral state of the race as consequent to the Adamic fall . In his moral
nature man is still the same as in his original constitution. Adam
was endowed with freedom and placed under a law of duty, but was
morallyj-udifferent as between good and evil. We have previously
shown that the notion of such indifference in a being morally consti-
tuted is irrational and contradictory to decisive facts. The denial of
primitive holiness is not a merely speculative error. The principle
of this denial carries with it a denial of the Adamic fall and the de-
pravity of the race, and therefore leaves no place for a system of evan-
gelical theology. There is no longer any need of atonement, or regen-
eration, or justification by faith, or a new spiritual life in Christ.
^ Wiggers : Augustinism, and Pelagianism, p. 85.
28
418 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
III. ELEMEIfTS OF PRIMITIVE HOLINESS.
The acceptance of primitive holiness as a truth does not neces-
sarily determine the view of its elements or nature. Hence in the
liistory of the doctrine opposing views appear. The issue thus
arising has been much in debate, and not as a question of merely
speculative interest, but as one which deeply concerns the nature
of the Adamic fall, of original sin, and of regeneration. Such
implications will sufficiently aj)pear in the statement of these oppos-
ing views.
1. Tlie Romish Doctrine. — The Romish anthropology is so far
Auffustinian as to accept the truth of a primitive holi-
PURELY A SIT- f' .^,^. ^, ,ii, j.- Ji
i"KiiNATiKAL ness, but widely diverges from the latter respecting the
''"■"'"• nature or content of that holiness. What is specially
distinctive of the Romish doctrine is that the primitive holiness
was purely a supernatural endowment or gift. As such it must
have been extraneous to the nature of Adam, and conferred subse-
quently to his completed creation. " The first peculiarity of the
papal anthropology consists in the tenet that original righfeons-
ness is not a natural, hut a super natural, endoioment. The germ
of this view appears in one of the statements of the Roman CatecJiism
— a work which followed the Tridentine Canons, and is of equal
authority with them in the papal Church. ' Lastly,' says the
Catechism,' ' God formed man out of the clay of the earth, so made
and constituted as to his material body that he was immortal and
impassible, not indeed by the force of nature itself, but by a divine
favor. But as to his soul, he formed him after his own image and
likeness, endowed him Avith free will, and so tempered within him
all the emotions of his mind and his appetites that they would never
disobey the rule of reason. Then ho added the admirable gift of orig-
inal righteousness, and decreed that he should have the pre-eminency
over other animals. '" '^ It thus appears that in the papal anthro-
pology the likeness and image of God in primitive man carried the
sense of a similarity in the nature and personality of mind, but not
the sense of holiness. Place was thus left for primitive holiness as
a supernatural endowment.
Consistently with this view of original righteousness, the papal
anthropoloo-y could admit, and did admit, certain im-
IMPERFKCTION \ ^-^ . . i, " . -j. i. T A • i.
OF TiiK I'RiMi- perfections of man as originally constituted. As consist-
TivE NATLRK. ^^^^ ^^ ^^gj^ ^^^ Spirit, thc appctcnccs of the former
might war against the rational dictates of the latter, and thus render
' Catechismus Romanus, P. I, Cap. ii, Q. 18.
* Shedd : History of Christian Doctrine, vol. ii, pp. 142, 143.
PRIMITIVE HOLINESS. 419
difficult a prudent and good life. There was thus in the very begin-
ning, and before any lapse of man, a profound moral need of the super-
natural endowment of grace which the doctrine maintains. And, fur-
ther, the primary purpose of this endowment was for the relief of this
exigency. So Bellarmin, a master in papal theology, states the
facts. " In the first place it is to be observed that man naturally
consists of flesh and spirit. . . . But from these diverse or contrary
propensities there arises in one and the same man a certain conflict,
and from this conflict great difficulty of acting rightly. ... In
the second place, it is to be observed that divine providence, in the
beginning of creation {initio creationis), in order to provide a rem-
edy for this disease or languor of human nature which arises from
the nature of a material organization {ex conditione matericB),
added to man a certain remarkable gift, to wit, original righteous-
ness, by which as by a sort of golden rein the inferior part might
easily be kept in subjection to the superior, and the superior to
Grod ; but the flesh was thus subjected to the spirit, so that it could
not be moved so long as the spirit was unwilling, nor could it
become a rebel to the sj^irit unless the spirit itself should become a
rebel to God, while yet it was wholly in the power of the spirit to
become or not become a rebel to God. . . . We think that this
rectitude of the inferior part was a supernatural gift, and that,
too, intrinsically, and not accidentally, so that it neither flowed
nor could flow from the principles of nature {ex naturcB prin-
cipiis)."^
These views are open to criticism, and are sharply criticised
from the side of the Augustinian anthropology. Such errors of the
original imperfections of man have no warrant in the doctrine.
Scriptures. Nor is there any ground for the exclusively super-
natural character of primitive holiness. Further, the doctrine
implies that the fall of man was simply a lapse into his primitive
state. The fall in its effect upon man, apart from personal demerit,
was simply a deprivation of the supernatural endowment of right-
eousness. His own nature was the same after the fall as before it.
But his own nature, while without holiness before the fall, v.-as
' equally without depravity, and must have remained the same, after
the fall. This is a very superficial and false view of the actual
state of man in consequence of the Adamic fall. The consequence
of that fall was not only a deprivation of the divine communion,
but a depravation of the nature of man. For the present we are
not concerned with another objection urged against this papal view
' Bellarminus : Gratia Primi Hominis, C. v. Cited by Sliedd : History of
Christian Doctrine, vol. ii, pp. 143, 144.
420 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
on the part of the Augustinian anthropology, that by implication
it denies the actual sinfulness and demerit of human nature as
fallen. Any view of regeneration in accord with this papal anthro-
pology must be superficial and false. It must mean simply a
restoration of original righteousness as a supernatural endowment.
8uch limitation must omit the interior work of the Holy Spirit in
the renewal and purification of the moral nature, which is the cen-
tral reality of regeneration. Finally, as this anthropology allows
the actuality and the innocence of a certain measure of concupis-
cence in primitive man, so it must allow the same in regenerate
man.
2. TJie Augustinian Doctrine. — By the doctrine so designated
we mean, not limitedly any definite view of Augustine himself
respecting the nature of primitive holiness, but rather the central
view of the Augustinian anthropology as interpreted and maintained
in the Calvinistic Churches. In this view original righteousness
was an intrinsic quality of the nature of man, not something added
to his nature. By the divine creative act he was constituted holy,
and there was not only no subsequent act, but no separate act by
which he was so constituted. It should not be overlooked that we
give this as the central or prevalent view, and without any notice
of individual divergences. As against the pajial view, "the re-
formers generally, and especially Luther, had strenuously contended
that this original righteousness was a quality of man's proper nat-
ure, and necessary to its perfection and completeness, and not a
supernatural gift."' Abo in dissent from the papal view of a
superadded holiness, " the reformers most justly assert, in opposi-
tion to this mechanical view, that 'justitia originalis ' was an orig-
inal and actual element of our nature as it came from the hand of
the Creator.""
On this question the Augustinian doctrine thus takes the oppo-
opposiTE TO ^^*® extreme to the papal view. This was quite natural
TiiK ROMISH to the protcstant attitude of the reformers and the
intensity of their antagonism to much of tlie jjapal
anthropology. Further, their doctrine of sin logically carried
them to this view of original righteousness. As in this doctrine
the very nature of man in his fallen state is actuall}'' sinful, or sin-
ful in a sense deserving of God's judicial wrath, so the nature of
primitive man in itself and without any gracious endowment could
be ethically righteous. The rejection of the papal view does not
' Cunningham : Historical Theology, vol. i, p. 518.
* Van Oosterzee : Christian Dogmatics, vol. i, p. 370. Also Hodge : Systein-
atic Theology, vol. ii, pp. 104, 105.
PRIMITIVE HOLINESS. 421
logically require the acceptance of this Augustinian view. In this
case, as in many others, the truth may lie between the extremes.
3. Elements of the True Doctrine. — The first element of primi-
tive holiness was the moral rectitude of the Adamic
. . RECTITUDE OF
nature as newly created. In our previous discussions adamic nat-
we fully maintained the possibility and the reality of ™^'
such holiness, and set forth the definite idea of its nature or con-
tent. That position holds true against the papal denial of such
holiness. We agree with the prevalent Augustinian anthropology
I respecting the reality of primitive holiness, but dissent respecting
I any proper ethical character of that holiness, and also respecting its
'limitation to a mere quality of the Adamic nature. In that
anthropology Adam often appears in the very beginning, and before
any personal action, with the moral worth of ethical righteousness,
with the activities of holy affection in the fear and love of God.^
We omit all this from the content of primitive holiness. The activ-
ities of holy affection may be spontaneous to the moral nature, but
must be subsequent to its own constitution. Nor can they be the
immediate product of the creative agency which constitutes the
nature. A thorough analysis must distinguish between the activ-
ities of the moral nature in Adam and that nature itself simply as
divinely created. That nature was so constituted as to be respon-
sive to the claims of a prudent and good life, not in the sense of a
necessary fulfillment of such claims, but in the sense of a spon-
taneous inclination or disposition toward such fulfillment. This is
all that we can properly mean by holiness as a quality of the prim-
itive nature of man.
There was a second element of primitive holiness in the presence
and agency of the Holy Spirit. We have previously presence of
dissented from the Augustinian limitation of that the spirit.
holiness to a mere quality of the Adamic nature. We have also
dissented from the papal doctrine of its purely supernatural char-
acter ; but the weighty objection, that it implies serious defects
in the nature of man as originally constituted, is valid only against
so extreme a view. The presence of the Holy Spirit as a constitu-
ent element of primitive holiness has no such implication. The
Adamic nature could be holy in its own quality and tendency, and
yet need the help of the Spirit for the requirements of a moral pro-
bation. Augustine himself held this view. " God had given man
an assistance, without which he could not have persevered in good if
he would. He could persevere if he would, because that aid {adju-
' Edwards : Works, vol. ii, pp. 386, 387 ; Wiggers : Augustinistn and Pela-
gianism, p. 142.
41-2 syste:\iatic theology.
toriuni) did not fail by which he could. Without this, he could
not retain the good which he might will." ' Hence the divine plan
might include the presence of the Si:)irit as an original and abiding
element in the holiness of man. We need this truth for the proper
interpretation of human depravity. The fall of man was not only
the loss of holiness, but also the corruption of his nature. This
corruption we may not ascribe to any immediate agency of God,
but may interpret it as the consequence of a withdrawment of the
presence and influence of the Holy Spirit. This is the doctrinal
meaning of '' depravation from deprivation." The most thorough
Augustinians so interpret the corruption of human nature, and thus
concede the presence of the Holy Spirit as an element of primitive
holiness.'
We thus combine the two elements in the true doctrine. The
A PRESKNCK IN sccoud clemcnt brings the doctrine into full accord
ALL HOLY LIFE, with thc fact that in the Christian life the Holy Spirit
is not only the agent in the primary renewal and purification of the
soul, but also an abiding presence in aid of its renewed powers.
And we are pleased to think of the immanence of the Spirit in all
holy life whether human or angelic.
' Cited by Wiggers : Augustinism and Pelagianism, p, 142.
' Cunningham : Historical Theology, vol. i, p. 526.
THE PRIMITIVE PROBATION. 423
CHAPTEE IV.
THE PBIMITIVE PKOBATIOia".
PKOBATioisr is a state of trial under a law of duty. The law in
the case is the test of obedience. The duty imposed is enforced
by the sanction of rewards. The rewards determine for the sub-
jects of probation permanent states of good or evil ; so that pro-
bation is a temporary economy. The central reality of probation
is resj)onsibiIity for conduct under a law of duty. Such was tlie
primitive probation ; and it should be studied in the light of these
facts.
I. Probation a Reasonable Economt.
This proposition is not intended for universal and perpetual ap-
plication. It is true in application to primitive man. Possibly a
primitive state might be so perfect as neither to require nor admit
any testing law. Such will be the state of confirmed blessedness.
Probably no primitive state is such. Certainly that of man was
not. For him trial was naturally incident to duty. Obedience,
however, was easily within his power, and a moral obligation, while
a law of duty was the imperative requirement of his moral constitu-
tion and relations. With the truth of these facts, the primitive
probation was a reasonable economy. The facts require a fuller
and more orderly statement.
1. Trial as Naturally Incident to Duty. — The fact of such trial
arose from the constitution of primitive man. With a holy nature,
there were yet in him susceptibilities to temptation. In temptation
there is an impulse in the sensibilities adverse to the law of duty.
This is true even where it finds no response in the personal con-
sciousness. Yet, in the measure of it, such impulse is a trial to
obedience. Such trial was naturally incident to duty in primitive
man. The proof of it is in a primitive constitution with sensibili-
ties which might be the means of temptation; also in the actuality
of such temptation. These facts are entirely consistent with the
primitive holiness which we have maintained. In such a state
primitive man began his moral life. The only way to confirmed
blessedness was through a temporary obedience. But obedience
requires a law of duty; and, with the natural incidence of trial and
the possibility of failure, such a law must be a testing law. It thus
424 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
appears that a probationary economy was the only one at all suited
to the state of primitive man.
2. Complete Ahilifi/ for Obedience. — Ability for obedience is a
rational requirement under a testing law of duty. The question
of such ability in primitive man needs no elaborate discussion, and
the mere statement of relative facts will suffice. The reality of
such ability lies in the rectitude of his moral nature as originally
constituted. "With susceptibility to temptation through the sensi-
bilities, his spontaneous disposition was yet toward the good and
averse to the evil. In this there was strength for obedience. Nor
can we rationally think of any divine imposition of duty in this
case above the ability of fulfillment. When responsibility with
moral inability is maintained, it must be on the ground of a respon-
sible forfeiture of moral ability. There was no such forfeiture
in the case of man when duty was originally imposed upon him.
God was at once the author of both his nature and the law of his
probation, and therefore could not impose any duty which should
transcend his strength of obedience. Further, this strength is fully
manifest in view of the special test of obedience divinely insti-
tuted. If the moral constitution of primitive man was what the
Scriptures warrant us to think it, the fulfillment of that duty was
easily M'ithin his power.
3. Obedience a Reasonable Requirement. — As the subject of such
munificent endowments, the recipient of so rich an estate and a
provisory heirship to eternal blessedness, primitive man owed the
consecration of all his powers in holy obedience and love to the
Author of all his good. Every principle of reason and duty so de-
termines. With the deepest emphasis, therefore, does every such
principle determine the obligation of the probationary duty im-
posed upon him.
4. Moral Xecessity for a Law of Duty. — With far less unreason
might we object to the creation of man as a moral being than to
his probationary trial under a law of duty. As morally constituted
and related, with the obligations of holy obedience and love, and
with the possibilities of both good and evil action, a law of duty
was for him an imperative requirement.
If we now combine the four facts presented under the head of
this section it must be clear that for primitive man probation was
a reasonable economy.
II. The Probationary Law.
1. A Matter of Divi?ie Determination. — The assignment of duty
to primitive man in the form of precept or commandment was
THE PRIMITIVE PROBATION. 425
purely the prerogative of God. Adam could not determine his
own duties, for he knew not sufficiently either himself or the
claims of his Creator. Some duties, such as the love and worship
of God, might stand in a clear light, and be seen as by intui-
tion; but what in the way of restraint might be requisite to his
best moral and religious develoi^ment could not thus be known.
These things could be known only to God; and the whole right of
commandment was his. He might impose any duty or any re-
straint concistent with his own wisdom. When we say consistent
with his own wisdom we mean that the perfections of God are a
law unto himself, so that he could impose nothing contrary to his
own wisdom. This fact, however, does not bring down the ways
of God to the measure of our own minds. We cannot judge him
as we judge men, for we stand on the same plane with them, while
God is in the infinite heights above us. There is here a place for
our trust in God, and an infinite warrant for it, even when the
light of his wisdom is hidden from our view. Such trust is far
wiser in us than any unfriendly criticism of the law whereby he
tested the fidelity of primitive man.
2. The Law as Divinely Instituted. — This law is plainly given
in the sacred narrative : " But of the tree of the knowledge of
good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it: for in the day that thou
eatest thereof thou shalt surely die."' Respecting the knowledge
of good and evil, the sense is not that the fruit of this tree could
by any virtue of its own give the knowledge of good and evil, but
rather that man, as obedient or disobedient to its divine interdic-
tion, should prove himself good or evil, or come to know in his
own experience the good or the evil. Such a sense best accords
with the testing function of the law.
We can hardly think that this one commandment constituted the
sum of duty for primitive man. There are moral ^ broader
laws which must exist for all moral beings. From the ^^^ o^ d^^tt.
beginning it must have been the duty of Adam to love and wor-
ship God. Such a religious life requires habits of thought and
disposition which in themselves fulfill religious duties. Nor is
there in tlie words of that one commandment any exclusion of
other duties. There was this specific commandment, and the first
sin was in its violation. So far the sacred narrative is clear.
There were other duties; but whether of a proper testing character,
or whether in case of fidelity under this first trial other tests
might have been instituted — on all such questions that narrative
is silent. With the obligation of other duties, the fidelity of Abra-
' Gen. ii, 17.
426 SYSTE3IATIC THEOLOGY.
ham was yet specially tried by a positive command. Such was the
manner of trial in the primitive probation; and, so far as the Scrij)t-
ures give us any clear light, such was the law of that probation.
3. A Proper Test of Ohediencc. — This law of the primitive pro-
bation was a positive law in distinction from a moral law. The
obligation of a moral law is intrinsic and absolute: the
MORAL. AND /= _ _ _ _ _ '
POSITIVE obligation of a positive law arises from a divine com-
LAws. mandment. Such a ground of obligation is in no con-
tradiction to the reality of fundamental principles of ethics. Nor
is such obligation grounded purely in authority. A divine com-
mand always means to the enlightened religious consciousness a
sufficient reason for the duty imposed, however hidden that reason
may be. There is thus a place for faith as the practical power of
obedience. The case of Abraham is an illustration. No reason
was given for the command to offer up his son. His faith, found
the reason for obedience, not in an absolute arbitrary authority of
God, but in the wisdom and goodness of his providence. Such is
the real ground of obligation in a positive command. For the
religious consciousness such obligation is absolute. K positive
command of God is not the dictum of an arbitrary will, but the
expression of his wisdom and love.
Nor is obedience to a positive command any abject submission
NO MKRE AR- ^^ ^^^ arbitrary absolute will. No such submission
BiTRARY WILL, could constitutc a true obedience. At most it could
be only a conformity of outward action to the jiositive mandate.
Such conformity is not in itself obedience, because without the mo-
tives of piety. Such was the case under this probationary law.
True obedience to its mandate required the motives of religious
reverence and love; and disobedience could arise only with an irre-
ligious revolt of the soul from God. It thus appears that a posi-
tive command of God is no arbitrary mandate of an absolute will,
indifferent to morality and piety, and which the most servile out-
ward observance will satisfy, but the expression and requirement of
his infinite wisdom and goodness as our moral Kuler, and which can
be fulfilled only with the truest obedience of a devout mind and a
loving heart. So closely one in obligation and fulfillment is a posi-
tive law of God with a moral law.
With the inexperience of primitive man as he entered the sphere
of probation, a positive law may have best suited the
PRIMITIVE purpose of a moral trial. There were sufficient reasons
81ATE. ^^ ^i^g divine Mind for its institution, and, as we shall
point out, it was most favorable to obedience. After a long experi-
ence of Abraham and the practical development of his moral and
THE PRIMITIVE PROBATION. 427
religious life, God found reason to test his obedience through a
positive command. Clearly, then, there might be sufficient rea-
son for such a trial of primitive man, whose conception of moral
principles was as yet without any development through experi-
ence.' Such a command was given him — a command which ad-
dressed itself to the deepest moral and religious consciousness,
and required for its proper observance the truest motives of a good
life. Further, it embodied the great religious lessons, that the will
of God is the supreme law of duty, and that the highest good of
man must be found in his loving favor, not in any pleasures of
sense. Such facts constituted this law of the primitive probation
a proper test of obedience.
III. Favorable Probationary Trial.
A few words will suffice to make it clear that the testing law of
the primitive probation was most favorable to obedience. We
require simply a brief statement of the leading facts concerned in
the question.
1. Laiv of Duty Open and Plain. — There was nothing occult or
perplexing in the meaning of the duty enjoined. No philosophic
acumen or insight was necessary to the fullest comprehension of its
meaning. It was simply the duty of abstinence from the fruit
of a tree definitely noted. There could be no j)lainer mandate of
duty.
2. Complete 3Ioral Healthfulness of Man. — As yet there was no
impulse of vicious or inordinate i:)assion ; no clouding or iDerversion
of the moral reason ; no evil habit which might fetter all endeavor
toward the good. There was still the full strength of the primi-
tive holiness, with its sj)ontaneous disposition to the obedience of
love.
3. Ample Sources of Satisfaction. — The garden which God j^re-
pared for man in the eastward of Eden was rich in beauty and
plenty. There grew in it " every tree that is pleasant to the sight,
and good for food."" There was all that could please the eye and
gratify the taste, all that could nourish the physical life. Above
all, there was the open presence of God and the privilege of com-
munion with him. Surely the forbidden fruit was no necessity to
the completest satisfaction of man.
4. Most Weighty Reasons for Ohedience. — This law of the primi-
tive probation was directly and openly from God, whose authority
' Dorner : Christian Doctrine, vol. ii, p. 81 ; Henry B. Smith : Christian
Theology, p. 261.
* Gen. ii, 9.
42*? SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
and majesty went forth with its mandate for the enforcement of
obedience. Man already knew God in his presence and glory, and
must have been deeply sensible to the obligation of obedience to his
will. Then the issues of life and death hung on the contingency of
obedience or disobedience. Such consequences were the revealed
sanctions of the law, and must have been somewhat apprehended in
their profound import — surely sufficiently to render them weighty
reasons for obedience. With such sanctions of a divine mandate,
sixh weighty reasons for its observance, the soul should be the
stronger against the solicitations of temptation, and full and prompt
obedience most easy.
If now we combine the four facts set forth in this section, and
view them in their relation to the primitive probation, it must be
manifest that that probation was most favorable to obedience.
TEMPTATION AND FALL OF MAN. 429
CHAPTER V.
TEMPTATION AND FALL OF MAN".
Theee was a temptation and fall of primitive man, with a con-
sequent fall of the race. These facts do not rest simply upon the
Mosaic narrative, but are fully recognized in the later Scriptures,
and especially in the New Testament. So far the questions of
the temptation and fall seem open and plain; but there are
perplexities for both exegesis and apologetics in the details of the
Mosaic narrative. In consequence of this we have a diversity of
interpretations, and some of them specially shaped for the relief of
these perplexities. This is permissible so far as it may be con-
sistent with a proper adherence to the historic character of the
narrative, and such adherence may allow some variation in the
interpretation of certain items. However, caution must be ob-
served, or the whole narrative will be so marred as to lose its his-
toric character. We shall not take much time with questions
which must remain obscure, and which belong to apologetics and
exegesis rather than to systematic theology.
I. The Primitive Temptation.
1. Concerning an Instrumental Agency. — On the face of the
narrative nothing seems plainer than the fact of an instrumental
agency in the temptation — that is, something used as the instru-
ment of a higher agency. There is, indeed, no mention of a higher
agency in the narrative itself, but the facts clearly require such an
agency. ' If the serpent which appears in the tempta- question op
tion is to be taken in the literal sense of an animal, t.ie instru-
there is still no satisfactory identification of it. " WJio ^^^'^'
was the serpent ? of what Mnd ? In what ivay did he seduce the
first happy pair ? These are questions which remain yet to be an-
sioered."'^ It is no wrong to the good doctor to say that, after his
own learned endeavor to identify this "nachash" with the ape or-
der, they still remained in the same unanswered state. There is a
widely prevalent tradition of the serpent as concerned in a tempta-
tion and fall of man, which in some instances is in close accordance
with the Mosaic narrative.
' Gen. iii, 1-5. ' Clarke : Commentary, in loc.
430 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
Wi Ai the literal sense of an animal in the temptation, the use of
PANTOMIMIC speech encounters strong objection, because there is
viKw. wanting the necessary organ. In order to avoid this
difficulty the part of the serpent, or other animal, has been inter-
preted as purely pantomimic in its mode. There is no relief in
this view. Such representative action is as much above the endow-
ment of an animal as the power of articulate speech. As the
mere instrument of a higher agency, an animal could be used in
the latter mode quite as easily as in the former.
There is another view which may be stated. It is, that serpent
SYMBOLICAL ^^ a symbollcal term for the designation of Satan him-
TiEw. self. With this interpretation there is no literal ser-
pent or other animal with any part in the temptation, but Satan is
the immediate and only agent, and the subject of the penal inflic-
tion. It is very difficult to adjust the items of the sacred narrative
to this view. It is further suggested that if no animal was present
in the temptation Satan might still have appeared in the semblance
of one.
2. A Higher, Satanic Agency. — As an animal could be only an
instrument in the temptation, so the facts of intelligence embodied
therein evince tlie presence of a higher agency. There is knowl-
edge of the divine command, reasoning about God, the nature of good
and evil, and the virtues of the forbidden fruit. These facts are
possible only to a rational intelligence. Even without the signs of
the deepest craft, there is still the full evidence of such an agency.
There is no open reference to a satanic agency in the narrative
SATAN NOT of the temptation. The devil is not named therein,
NAMED. but there is the manifestation of a malignance and
craft which clearly points to his agency. The scriptural charac-
terization of the devil and the evil works attributed to liim affirm
the same fact. He is the enemy that sowed the tares among the
good seed which the Son of man cast into the field of the world.*
He is a murderer and a liar from the beginning, and there is no
truth in him." He is " that old serpent, called the devil, and
Satan, which deceiveth the whole world."' In mentioning the
serpent as beguiling Eve the thought of Paul cannot rest with the
mere instrument in the temptation, but must include the agency
of the devil under the same designation.*
3. Manner of the Temptation. — Under this head we need no
longer any distinction between the instrument and the real agent in
the temptation. For the manner of the temptation we need little
more than the facts as grouped in the sacred narrative. The
' Matt, xiii, 37-39. ^ John viii, 44. ^ Rev. xii, 9. ■• 2 Cor. xi, 3.
TEMPTATION AND FALL OF MAN. 431
subtlety of the devil appears throiigli the whole process of the
temptation. There was craft in beginning with Eve in the absence
of Adam. The two together would have been stronger than either
alone; and presumably Eve was understood to be the more sus-
ceptible to temptation. The divine command is inquiringly ap-
jDroached, with the stealthy suggestion of an unnecessary restric-
tion of privilege. Then with cunning boldness the penalty of
disobedience is denied: "Ye shall not surely die." Suspicion of
divine duplicity is insinuated : God himself knows that, instead
of evil, only good shall come of eating the interdicted fruit.'
Thus the apprehension of death and the strength of religious rev-
erence and love were greatly weakened, while the forbidden fruit
was set in such false lights as to excite a very strong desire to
partake of it.
II. The Eall of Man^.
For the present we need only a brief statement of the more open
facts of the fall. The deeper questions of depravity and sin will
receive their special treatment further on in our discussions.
1. Entering Into the Temptation. — The mental process through
which Eve entered into the temptation is much more cental movk-
fully given than in the case of Adam. On a colloca- ^'^^^'^ «■' ^^'^■^
tion of the temptation and the result, her own mental movement
becomes obvious. The former we have already considered. The
latter is seen in the new light in which the prohibited fruit
appeared to her. Through the illusive coloring of the temptation
it seemed beautiful to the eye, good for food, and desirable to make
one wise. Through the impulse of the appetence thus begotten she
took of the fruit, and did eat.^ It was an open violation of the
divine command.
She "gave also unto her husband with her ; and he did eat."
This is the sum of the account in the case of Adam.'
Yet it is hardly to be thought that, without any hesi-
tation or questioning, he at once accepted the fruit simply on the
proffer of his wife. There may be omitted facts. Otherwise the
entrance of Adam into the temptation is far stranger than that of
Eve.
2. Penalty of the Sinning. — Death is the penal term of the pro-
bationary law, and signifies the punishment of dis- ^^^g ^f in-
obedience to the divine command." There is in the terpretation.
law no explanation of the penal term, and we must find its full
meaning in a proper view of man as its subject, and in its subse-
quent use in Scripture. Nor should that primary sense be modified
' Gen. iii, 1-5. ^ Gen. iii, 6. ^Qen. iii, 6, 13, 17. " Gen. ii, 17.
432 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
by any partial or provisory arrest of judgment upon the intervention
of a redemptive economy. The announcement of such an economy
preceded the judicial treatment of the primitive sin.'
There is a threefold sense in which man may be the subject of
death, and also a corresponding meaning of the term
THREEFOLD . ' . 1 O O
sKNSE OK in its Scripture use.
'"'■'^^"" It is the clear sense of Scripture that perpetual life was
the provisory heritage of man. Obedience would have secured
his providential exemption from death. This was provided for and
pledged in the tree of life — probably through a sacramental use of
its fruit, rather than by any intrinsic virtue which it might possess.
By the divine judgment, and by expulsion from the tree of life, pen-
alty in the form of physical death was inflicted upon man.* St.
Paul confirms this sense of physical death in the original penalty
uf disobedience.'
There is also a spiritual death in distinction from the spiritual
life — such as man originally possessed.'' This death is inseparably
connected with sin, and must have been the immediate consequence
of sin in Adam.* His spiritual life was fully realized only in
union with the Holy Spirit. Sin was the severance of that union,
with the consequence of spiritual death. Such was now the state
of Adam and Eve. With the full execution of the penalty this
death must have been utter. But it is reasonable to think that in
this case, as in that of physical death, there was a partial arrest of
judgment, or an instant gift of helping grace, through the re-
demptive mediation already instituted.
There is still a third sense of the penal term — that of eternal
death. This is not the place for the discussion of the question
concerning the ultimate doom of sin. Eternal death is the final
penal allotment of the unsaved. Beyond this fact of penal allot-
ment, it is rather the full intensity and perpetuity of spiritual death
than a distinct form of death. In view of the nature of man as
morally constituted and endowed with immortality, and in view of
the final doom of sin as revealed in the Scriptures, the penal term
in the probationary law meant eternal death.
3. Fall of the Race. — This question arises only incidentally in
the present connection. The race is fallen and morally corrupt
through the sin and fall of its progenitors. These consequences,
however, must be interpreted in a sense consistent with determin-
ing facts in the case. But for the immediate intervention of a
>Gen. iii, 15. '^ Gen. iii, 19, 22-24. ^pom. v, 12.
* John V, 24 ; Rom. viii, 6 ; 1 John iii, 14.
"Eom. viii, 2 ; Eph. ii, 1 ; Col. ii, 13.
TEMPTATION AND FALL OF M.VN. 433
redemptive economy the penalty of death must have been promptly
executed according to its own terms. This execution must have
precluded the propagation and existence of the race. This preclu-
sion as an actuality could not have been a penalty, because a never-
existent race could not sulfer a penalty. Hence the race was not
liable to the original penalty in the same manner as its progenitors
who transgressed the law; yet it is in a state of moral depravity
and subject to death in consequence of their sin and fall. This is
the sense of the Scriptures. The law of these results is for later
treatment.
III. Freedom of Man i]sr Falling.
The question of freedom is here treated simply in relation to our
progenitors in the primitive sin. It will be presented in the light
of a few facts which seem conclusive of its reality.
1. Proiationary Ohedieiice a Divine Preference. — This position
seems most sure. The infinite holiness and goodness of God aflBrm
his good pleasure against the sin and misery of the fall. There-
fore the probationary obedience which was the necessary condition
of their prevention must have been his preference. Further, he
must have electively preferred obedience to his own command.
The contrary is not to be thought, for God's preference of obedience
must always go with his command. Obedience to this primitive
command would have secured the standing of our progenitors in
holiness and happiness. Therefore that standing must have been
a divine preference.
2. Divine Gift of the Power of Ohcdiencc. — No one can wish any
action of another without wishing him tlie requisite ability. This
law must be real for God. If he wished the obedience, holiness,
and happiness of our progenitors, he must have washed them the
power of obedience as the necessary condition of tliese blessings.
Therefore they must have possessed the power of obedience as a
divine endowment. In this probationary trial they were just
what God made them. He ordained the law of their duty, with
perfect knowledge of their constitution, and in full foresight of
their trial. It follows that, with an elective preference of obedi-
ence, he must have given them the power of obedience.
3. Poiver of Obedience Intrinsic to Probation. — The progenitors
of the race were placed on probation under a testing law of obedi-
ence. The probationary character of that economy is above ques-
tion. The power of obedience to the testing law of duty is essen-
tial to such an economy. There can be no testing of fidelity under
a law of duty where there is not the power of obedience. As it is
29
434 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
truly said " tliat a state of trial supposes of course a capability of
falling, and cannot exist without it," ' so with equal truth it may
be said that a state of trial supposes of course a capability of
standing, and cannot exist without it. Thus again the power of
obedience in the Adamic probation is manifest.
4. The Facts Conclusive of Freedom ifi Falling. — The facts
treated in this section are conclusive of the power of obedience in
t!ie primitive probation. With this power there must have been
freedom in the falling,
IV. SiNxiNG OF Holy Beings.
Whatever the perplexities of this question, they are not peculiar
to revelation, but must equally concern, every philosophy or re-
ligion which admits the reality of moral evil. The Mosaic narra-
tive of the sin and fall of man is not the cause of the prevalent
moral evil, but simply the account of its origin in the human race.
There is no more rational account. The denial of this account
abates nothing of either the reality or the magnitude of moral evil."
Either man was originally constituted evil, or he has lapsed into
evil from a higlier and better state. Such a state must have been
one of primitive holiness, as previously set forth. As morally con-
stituted in his creation, man could not have been indifferent as
between good and evil. A moral nature must have moral tend-
encies,. There is surely no relief of perplexity in the supposition
of original evil tendencies. On the rejection of this view, we must
accept the only alternative of an origin of moral evil in a race pri-
marily holy. This implies the sinning of holy beings.
1. The Qnestion iji the Light of the Facts. — Conceivably, a
primitive state might be such that sinning would seem to be a
moral impossibility. With entire freedom, not only from inner
tendencies, but also from outward solicitation toward evil, with
strong inner tendencies toward the good, and with all exterior in-
fluences acting in full harmony with the inner tendencies, holy
action would seem to be thoroughly assured. The origin of sin in
such a state could have no rational explication. Even the moral
possibility of it is beyond the grasp of rational thought. Such,
however, was not the primitive state of man. While Adam and
Eve were constituted holy in their moral nature, the spontaneous
tendencies of which were toward the good, yet in their complete con-
stitution there were susceptibilities to temptation which might be
followed into sinful action. The present question concerning the
sinning of holy beings must be treated in the light of these facts.
'Dwight: TJieology, vol. i, p. 414. 'Sherlock : Works, vol. iv, p. 156.
TEMPTATION AND FALL OF MAN. 435
2. Primitive Susceptibilities to Temptation. — In the sensibilities
of primitive man there was a ground of temptability. Through
these sensibilities there could be solicitations, awakened appetencies,
not directly toward sinful action as such, but toward forms of ac-
tion which might be sinful, and even if known to be such. We
have an illustration in the case of Eve. Appetencies are awak-
ened for the forbidden fruit as it is set forth in the false light of
the temptation. So far as purely spontaneous, these active sensi-
bilities were innocent and entirely consistent with the primitive
holiness. Sin could arise only as their solicitations were unduly
entertained or followed into some voluntary infraction of the law
of probation. But as purely spontaneous, and while yet within
the limit of innocence, they could act as an impulse toward a vol-
untary infraction.
3. Moral Forces Available for Obedience. — In the constitution of
primitive man there were certain moral forces which might act as
a restraint upon any tendency toward evil-doing. If these forces
were sufficiently strong, and exerted their full strength in a purely
spontaneous mode, they would so fully counteract all tendency to-
ward evil, and so enforce obedience, that sinning might still seem
to be a moral impossibility. They were sufficiently strong, and
spontaneous under proper conditions, but not irrespective of such
conditions. It follows that they were not in any purely sponta-
neous mode determinative of obedience. The whole question can be
set in a clearer light by application to two leading forces in support
of obedience — love and fear.
The love of God, for which the soul was originally endowed, is
a practical power of obedience. It is an impulse to- practical
ward obedience, and, unless in some way counteracted, force of
must secure obedience.' Hence it might fully restrain
all tendencies toward disobedience. It was so available against the
primitive temptation. But love is so operative only when in an
active state. This state is conditioned on a proper mental appre-
hension of God. No object can quicken the correlate affection into
an active state except when livingly in the grasp of thought. The
constitution of primitive man did not necessitate such a constant
apprehension of God. A temporary diversion of thought was possi-
ble, and without sin. The temptation led to such a diversion, and
so clouded the vision of God as to prevent the practical force of
love. In this state love could no longer counteract the impulses
of awakened appetence, and disobedience might follow.
We named fear as another leading practical force. It is here
1 Jolm xiv, 33.
436 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
viewed, uot iu the sense of religious reverence, but as the appre-
hension of penalty. The fear of penalty may act as
FORCE OK a restraint upon any tendencies toward evil. But its
FEAR. practical force is conditioned on the same law as love,
and hence in the same manner may fail of practical result. This
is illustrated in the case of Eve. The temptation first engendered
doubt of the penalty, and then occupied the attention with the at-
tractions of the forbidden fruit. In this mental state fear could
not act as an effective restraint upon the impulses of awakened ap-
petite. Even a partial doubt or forgetting would void its practical
force. In such a state the solicitations of temptation might be
followed into disobedience.
4. The Sinning Clearly Possible. — The sinning of Adam and
Eve is a truth of the Scriptures. The facts presented in this sec-
tion clearly show the possibility of this sinning, notwithstanding
the original holiness of their nature. We thus have in the Script-
ures a thoroughly consistent account, and the most rational account
of the origin of sin in human history.'
V. Divine Permission of the Fall.
Moral evil is the common lot of man, whatever its origin. Its exist-
ence is a question of profound perplexity. A denial of the Scripture
account of its origin in the Adamic fall neither voids its reality nor in
the least mitigates its perplexity. We shall long wait for a theodicy.
We do not think such an attainment possible in our present state.
The divine permission of the Adamic fall was not in any sense
Ko SENSE OF ^''''^ oxpressiou of consent or the granting of a license.
CONSENT. The deed of sin by which man fell was definitely for-
bidden, and under the weightiest sanctions. Hence the meaning
of the divine permission must be simply that God did not sov-
ereignly and effectively interpose for the prevention of the fall. It
has often been said that he could not have so interposed consist-
ently with the moral freedom of man. There is truth in this, but
not such truth as fully resolves the question. Other questions are
thus raised respecting the creation and probationary trial of per-
sonal beings endowed with responsible moral agency. If God
could not consistently interfere with the free action of primitive
man, so as to prevent the fall, could he rightfully constitute man a
free moral agent and place him on a probationary trial ? These
are the questions which first of all concern the divine permission
of the fall. If there be for us any present light, it must come with
the answer to these questions. ,
' Batler : Analogy, part i, chap, v, sec. iv.
TEMPTATION AND FALL OF MAN. 437
1. Tlie Creation of Moral Beings Permissible. — A being personally
constituted and endowed with free moral agency must be under law
to God, and responsible for his conduct. On the truth of theism
and the reality of absolute moral principles, this must be so. Even
God could not release such a being from moral duty and responsi-
bility. Yet the creation of such a being must be permissible in
God. To deny this permissibility is to restrict the creative agency
of God to the spheres of material and impersonal existences. Or,
if the highest grade might reach the capacity of rational intelligence,
there must be no supreme endowment of a moral nature. Only in
such a being is the true likeness of God reached ; and yet in no
creative fiat must he say, ''in our image, after our likeness." Only
a most arrogant and daring mind could prescribe such limitations
for God, or deny him the rightful privilege of creating moral be-
ings capable of a worshipful recognition of himself.
2. Permissiiility of a Probationary Economy. — Probation is a
temporal, testing economy. There is a law of duty, with the sanc-
tion of rewards. For disobedience there must be at least a withhold-
ing of some attainable good; for obedience, the bestowment of some
blessing. The state of probation may be longer or shorter, with
less or greater trial. No exact limit of duration or measure of trial is
intrinsic to such an economy. The essential fact of probation under
a testing law of duty is moral responsibility. Such was the essen-
tial fact of the Adamic probation. If we declare that probation
inconsistent with the divine providence, it will be most difficult,
impossible indeed, to reconcile any known facts of moral responsi-
bility with such a providence. We should thus deny the permissi-
bility of a moral system under the providence of God. Yet there
is such a system, and the moral consciousness of the race is witness
to its reality. We are under a law of moral duty and responsibil-
ity. We cannot deny the consistency of this law with the prov-
idence of God. Therefore we must admit the permissibility of the
Adamic probation.
3. Permissibility of tlie Fall. — With the reality of moral obli-
gation and responsibility, the punishment of sin must be just. If
the punishment is just, the permission of the sin cannot be unjust.
We cannot say less respecting the primary Adamic sin. We have
previously pointed out how favorable the primitive probation was
to obedience. If justice or even goodness required the divine pre-
vention of sin in such a state, no state is conceivable in which it
might be permitted. Then all sin must be prevented ; and such a
requirement must forbid the creation of personal beings endowed
with free moral agency. There can be no such requirement. It is
438 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
entirely consistent with the providence of God that spiritual good
us well as secular good should be conditioned on proper conduct in
man. The providential means of subsistence are conditioned on a
proper industry and prudence. If through idleness and improvi-
dence any come to want, they have no riglit to impeach this econ-
omy. Plentiful industry and beggarly laziness are under the
same providential economy. If that economy is just to the one it
cannot be unjust to the other. Tlie obedient who reap the rich har-
vest of spiritual good and the disobedient who suffer the penalty of
sin are under the same moral economy. If that economy is right
to the one it cannot be wrong to the other. If the moral economy
be righteous there can be no requirement of providence sovereignly
to prevent the sin which may forfeit its blessings.
4. The Event Changes Not the Economy. — If Adam had rendered
obedience to the law of his probation, retained his innocence and
rich inheritance, and risen to the fuller reward of his fidelity, even
the most querulous could hardly object to the economy under which
he was placed. That he sinned and fell alters not in the least the
character of that economy. If good in the standing and the per-
j)etuated blessedness, it could not in itself be other in the falling
and the forfeiture of blessedness.
5. Redemption and the Permission of the Fall. — We have omitted
PKRMissioN IN ^ome facts usually set forth for the vindication of prov-
ouDL-n TO RE- idence in the permission of the fall. Among all these
DKMPTioN. fj^^^g ^i^g ^.j^-^,f ^^^ -g ^i^-g . Q_^^ permitted the fall of
man that he might provide a redemption for the race so ruined, and
through its infinite grace and love bring a far greater good to the
moral universe, and especially to the human race. Mr. Wesley
strongly supported this view, and thought it quite sufficient to clear
the question of the fall of all perplexity, so far as it concerned the
divine wisdom and goodness.' The argument is that through the
atonement in Christ, rendered necessary by the fall, mankind has
gained a higher capacity for holiness and hapiDiness in the present
life, and also for eternal blessedness. This higher capacity arises
with the broader spheres of religious faith and love which the atone-
ment opens. By this revelation of the divine goodness both faith
and love may reach a measure not otherwise attainable. Also the
Bufferings which came with the fall provided a necessar}^ condition
for the graces of patience, meekness, gentleness, long-suffering,
which contribute so much to the higliest Christian life. In a like
manner there is for us a higher blessedness in heaven.
There is some truth in the facts so presented, but not enough for
' Sermon Ixiv.
TEMPTATION AND FALL OF MAN. 439
the conclusion so confidently asserted. Besides, there are other
facts which deeply concern the main question that are j^^t an ex-
entirely overlooked. It is not to be questioned that ila.nation.
the gift of the Son for our redemption is the highest manifestation
of the divine goodness, and therefore the fullest warrant of faith
and the intensest motive of love. But is it not equally true that
through the fall we have suffered loss in our capacity for both
faith and love ? There is in our fallen nature an alienation from
God, and so strong that often the weightiest motives of his love
are persistently resisted. Further, if it be true that all who accept
the grace of salvation are raised to a measure of love and blessedness
not attainable in an unfallen state, it is equally true that the fall is
the occasion of final ruin to many. The point we make is, that, if
this question is to be brought into rational treatment, account must
be taken of all these facts. When this is done it cannot seem so
clear that the fall is the occasion of an infinite gain to the race.
Any such attempt, not only to vindicate the divine justice, but
even to glorify the divine love in the permission of the perplexing
fall, must proceed on the assumption of its possible implications.
prevention consistently with the freedom of man. On such an
assumption, the fall itself must have been completely within the
disposition of the divine providence; and, if still permissible for the
sake of a greater good to the race, why might it not have been pro-
cured for the same end? The theory must thus appear in open
contrariety to the divine holiness. This result discredits it ; for
not even the love of God must be glorified at the expense of his
holiness. Nor is it within the grasp of human thought that sin,
the greatest evil, can be necessary to the greatest good of the moral
universe. It is still true that an immeasurable good will arise
from the atonement in Christ; but it is not the sense of Scripture
that the fall was any part of a providential economy for the sake
of that good. The Scriptures glorify the love of God in the
redemption of the world, but ever as a love of compassion for a
sinful and perishing world, not as an anterior benevolence which
must accept moral evil as the necessary condition of its richest
blessings. We may surely say that the providential perpetuation
of the fallen race without the redemptive mediation of Christ could
not be reconciled with the righteousness of God, and so far we have
in redemption an element of theodicy, but we have therein no
rational account of the divine permission of the fall.
6. Qiiestion of the Fall of Ayigels. — The fact of such a fall is
clearly the sense of Scripture ; ' but tliere are no details which give
1 John viii, 44 ; 2 Pet, ii, 4 ; Jude 6.
440 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
us any insight into the nature of their temptation or the manner
of their entering into it. So far, the fall of an";els
GROUNDS OF . ^ • i i « ,i »
THE possiniL- stands in mucli greater obscurity than the fall of man.
"^'' Yet for the posdbility of a fall some facts are obvi-
ous. Tlio primary state of such angels must have been probation-
ary. There must have been for them a state of trial under a
testing law of duty, and also some form of susceptibility to tempta-
tion. It may have been very different from that in primitive man,
but must have been equally a reality, for otherwise there could
have been no fall. Whatever the nature of this susceptibility,
it must have been such that it could be consistent with primitive
holiness, for, as the immediate creation of God, all angels must
have begun their moral life with a holy nature. They must have
been endowed with the power of obedience to the requirements
of the divine will, for otherwise they could have had no proper
moral trial, nor could their penal doom be a just retribution. So
far we must find in the fall of angels the same principles which
we found in the fall of man. There is one distinction which should
be noted. The fall of primitive man was in a profound
NOT AS THE ^ A
KALL OF A sense the fall of the race. There was no such race-con-
^'''^^' nection of angels. Each angel that fell must have fallen
by his own personal sin. It is entirely consistent with this fact,
and the most rational view of the case, that some one led in a revolt
from God and by some mode of temptation induced the following
of others.
DOCTRINE OF NATIVE DEPRAVITY. 441
CHAPTER VI.
DOCTRINE OF NATIVE DEPRAVITY.
I. FoEMULA OF Original Sin.
1. Analysis of the Formula. — Original sin, as a doctrinal for-
mula, is common to the orthodox creeds for the expression and
characterization of native sinfulness. Augustine first brought it
into prominence for this purpose, but it is older than Augustine,
and its first doctrinal use is ascribed to Tertullian. For any doc-
trinal formula so long in use, and so fundamental,
... -, . 'NO PRESCRIPT-
some might claim a prescriptive authority. Such for- ivk author-
mulas, however, are human creations, and, while entitled "^ "
to most respectful consideration, must be open to questioning re-
specting the doctrines for which they stand. Esjjecially must their
interpretation in doctrinal discussion be open to questioning, for
often several questions of doctrine are treated as one question, or as
inseparable questions, which a proper analysis and method must
separate and treat separately. This is necessary to clearness of
doctrinal view. There has been much neglect of such method in
the treatment of original sin.
In the Augustinian anthropology, and in the creeds Avhich for-
mulate a doctrine of sin according to that anthrojiology, j,, ^^^^ ^^
original sin includes a common guilt of Adam's sin, a analysis.
common native depravity as the consequence of that guilt, and a
sinfulness of the depravity which in all men deserves both temporal
and eternal punishment.' It is further maintained by Augustin-
ians that native depravity is itself a punishment inflicted upon all
men on the ground of a participation in the sin of Adam. This
account of depravity as a retribution of the divine justice makes
that retribution a j)art of the doctrine of original sin. We thus
find in this formula several questions of fact which are without any
Giich logical or scientific connection that the truth of one must
carry -with it the truth of any other, much less the truth of all the
others. It is for the reason of this unification of distinct questions
that the doctrinal formula which represents them requires thorough
' Augsburg Confession, article ii ; Belgic Confession, article xv ; Articles of
the Church, of England, article ix ; Westminster Confession, chap. vi. In
Schaff : Creeds of Christendom, vol. iii, j)p. 8, 400, 492, 615.
442 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
analysis. The jumbling method of treating these several questions
as one truth of original sin should give place to their separation and
separate treatment. Clearness of view and truth of doctrine are
not otherwise attainable.
2. Doctrinal Isolation of Native Depravity. — The question of
native depravity is simply the question whether man is by nature or
birth morally depraved or corrupt, alien from the spiritual life, and
inclined to evil. Whether on any ground, or under any law, he is
a sharer in the sin of Adam, or in the guilt of his sin ; or whether
depravity as a fact is a divine punishment justly inflicted on
the ground of a common participation in that sin ; or whether
depravity itself is of the nature of sin and deserves the eternal retri-
bution of the divine justice — these are questions distinct and apart
from the one question rcsj)ccting native depravity. The truth of
this question does not depend upon the truth of the others. In the
further treatment of anthropology these questions must be consid-
ered. They hold such a place in doctrinal creeds and theological
discussions that they could not with any propriety be omitted.
Each will find its proper place in our discussion. For the present
we are concerned only with the separate and distinct question of
native depravity.
II. DOCTRIXAL SeXSE OF DePRAYITY.
1. A Subjective Moral State. — Depravity is within us and of us,
MANiKKST IN iiot, iiowcvor, as a physical entity or any form of essen-
iTs ACTiviTii s. ^j, J existence, but as a moral condition or state. As such,
it is below consciousness, and metaphysical for thought, but reveals
itself in its activities. These activities are conclusive of both its
reality and evil quality. In its purely metaphysical form it is not
easily grasped in thought, but this fact does not in the least hinder
the mental apprehension of its reality. Many things are beyond
apprehension in their mode, 3'et fully certain in their reality. We
know not the difference in the inner states of the lion and the
lamb, but Ave know that there is a difference which determines the
ferocity of the one and the gentleness of the other. There are dif-
ferences in the lives of men which lead to the certainty of a differ-
ence of inner states. Some lives are in the works of the flesh, and
others in the fruits of the Spirit, as Paul has drawn the contrast.'
Such differences cannot s^^ring from a common inner state of the
soul. What thus appears in different lives is often exemplified in
the same life. There are many instances of great change in indi-
vidual lives. Sometimes the change is from a kind and gracious
J Gal. V, 19-03.
DOCTRINE OF NATIVE DEPRAVITY. 443
life into a hard and selfish one, but much oftener a secular, selfish,
and evil life is trausformed into a spiritual, generous, and good one.
With such changes of the actual life there must be like changes of
the subjective state. The spontaneous impulses and dispositions
must be radically changed. There is no other account of such
changes in the habits of life. In the light of such facts we may see
the possibility, and in some measure the sense, of a subjective state
of depravity, a state of the inner nature which is alien from the
spiritual life and inclined to evil.
2, Broadly in the Sensuous and lloral Nature. — Theologians
often locate depravity in the will. This is simj^ly a part ^ ^ ^^ ^jjj„
tf the error of treating the will as a person endowed ively in the
dth the powers of personal agency. Thus intellect and ^^^^'
sensibility are ascribed to the will, and also many forms of personal
action. There is error in the will, and evil impulse and inclination,
■ while it resists the motives to the good and rebels against the law of
duty. These are mistaken views. The will is not a person, not in
itself an agent, but simply an instrumental faculty of mind, which
completes its power of personal action. There is no impulse or
inclination in the will itself. All impulse and inclination are from
the sensibilities. The motives of action which arise through the
sensibilities address their solicitations to the personal agent, and it
is not for his will, but for himself in the use of his will, to refuse
or accept these solicitations. In the light of such facts it is clearly
a mistake to locate depravity in the will. The ground is entirely too
narrow for the characteristic facts of depravity. The willing power,
especially within the moral sphere, is deeply involved in the deprav-
ity of our nature, but rather through the perversion of the sensibilities
and the moral nature than by any direct effect upon the will itself.
The sensuous nature, as we here use the term, is much broader
ithan the physical nature, and the seat of many other j^ ^he sensu-
,' sensibilities than the appetencies regarded as more o^'^ nature.
' specially physical. These manifold feelings have their proper
functions in the economy of human life. In a healthful tone
and normal state of the sensuous nature, these feelings are sub-
ordinate to the sense of prudence and the moral reason, and may
thus fulfill their functions consistently with the spiritual life.
There may be a disordered state of tlie sensuous nature, with the
result of inordinate sensibilities. Thus arise evil tendencies and
vicious impulses and appetencies, inordinate forms of feeling — all
that may bo included in ^' the lust of the flesh, and the lust of
the eyes, and the i:)ride of life. " ^ There are in human life many
' 1 Jolin ii, 16.
444 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
instances of such perverted and inordinate sensibilities as clearly
evince a disordered state of the sensuous nature. Such a disordered
state is a part of the depravity of human nature.
The moral nature is tlie seat of conscience and the moral reason.
IN TiiK MoKAL Tlicrc may be a disordered state of the moral nature,
NATURE. just as of the sensuous ; a state in which the moral
reason is darkened or perverted, and the conscience voiceless or
practically powerless. In such a state moral duty is neither clearly
seen nor properly enforced. God is far away, or so dimly seen that
the vision of him has little or no ruling power; for, while in the
reality of his existence he might still be apprehended in the intui-
tive or logical reason, it is only in the apprehension of the moral
consciousness that he becomes a living presence. In such a state
the soul is morally weak, and the sensibilities, selfish and secular in
impulse and tendency, and without proper moral restraint, easily run
to excess and dominate the life. There are in human life many in-
stances of such facts. It may be said, and truly, that this moral
disorder, especially in its extreme forms, is often the result of
vicious habits ; but this does not change either the nature or the
reality of such a subjective state. So far it has been our special
aim to point out the nature and possibility of such a state. There
may be, and there is, a disordered condition of our moral nature.
Its manifestations often appear so early in life as to evince its
congenital character. Such a disordered condition of the moral
powers is a part of the depravity of human nature. We thus
locate depravity in both the sensuous and the moral nature.
There is at once a lilthiuess of both " the flesh and the spirit."' '
3. Meaning of Depravation from Beiyrivation. — In the discussion
of the primitive holiness we fully recognized the presence of the
Holy Spirit as the source of its highest form. We did not accept
the Papal view, that original righteousness was wholly a gracious
endowment, superadded after the creation of man, but held the
Adamic nature just as created to be upright in itself. In entire
consistency with this view we held the presence of the Spirit as the
source of the fuller strength and tone of that holiness. Provision
was thus complete for the more thorough subordination of all sen-
suous impulses and appetencies, and the complete dominance of the
moral and spiritual life. As the result of sin there was a depriva-
tion of the Holy Spirit, and in consequence of this loss a deprava-
tion of man's nature. In addition to the more direct effect of sin
upon the sensuous and moral nature, there was a loss of all the
moi-al strength and tone immediately arising from the presence and
' 2 Cor. vii, 1.
DOCTRINE OF NATIVE DEPRAVITY. 445
agency of the Holy Spirit. The detriment was twofold, and in con-
sequence the depravation was the deeper. In this view we still find
depravity as a disordered state of the sensuous and moral nature.
4. Characteristic Evil Tendency of Depravity. — The orthodox
\ creeds uniformly note an inclination to evil or to sin as a character-
i istic fact of native depravity. In the words of our own creed, man
as fallen and corrupt is ''of his own nature inclined to evil, and
. that continually." ^ In the words of another, we are in consequence
of the original corruption of our nature "wholly inclined to all evil. "' '^
This evil tendency is often given as the constitutive fact
■^ . ° . DISTINCTION
of depravity. Thus: " The corruption of human nature of statk and
means its tendency to sin." ' Again: " Original sin is an '^^^'"''•^•^^•
inclination born with us; an impulse which is agreeable to us; a cer-
tain influence which leads us into the commission of sin."^ Midler
gives the same view in holding that the evidences of a common de-
pravity ''fully justify the old theological expression j9ece«/«w? origi-
nale, understanding it as simply affirming the existence of an innate
tendency or bias toward sin in every human being." ^ This view is
not strictly correct. It proceeds with insufficient analysis, and
therefore falls short of scientific accuracy. This inclination to evil
is the result of native depravity, not its constitutive fact. Deprav-
lity itself lies deeper, and the tendency to evil is a mode of its activ-
ity and manifestation. The question of this evil tendency will be
further treated in connection witli the proofs of depravity. So far
we have simply aimed to disconnect the question of depravity from
the others associated with it under the formula of original sin, and
to give its doctrinal sense as a distinct and separate question.
' Article vii. ^ Confession of Faith, chap, vi, sec. 4. ^ Chalmers.
* Melanchthon. * Christian Doctrine of Sin, vol. ii, p. 268.
4^1) SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
CHAPTER VII.
PROOFS OF NATIVE DEPRAVITY.
The proofs of native depravity lie mostly in the Scriptures: partly,
SUMMARY OF ^^ ^lic morc direct testimony of particular texts ;
PROOFS. partly>- in the imjDossibility of righteousness and life
by the law, and the necessity for the atonement and spiritual
regeneration. Further proof lies in the universality of actual
sin. Both the Scriptures and the history of the race witness to
the truth of this universality, and the common religious coiji-
sciousness confirms their testimony. Native depravity, with its
characteristic evil tendency, is the only rational account of uni-
versal actual sin, and thus finds its proof in that universality.
The manifold evils of the present life, the mortality of the race in
the Scripture account of it, the small success of providential agen-
cies for the moral and religious improvement of mankind, and the
common spiritual apathy give further j)roof of a moral lapse of
the race. We have thus briefly outlined the evidences of native
depravity which we shall present in this chapter.
I. More Direct Scripture Proofs.
1. Testimony of Particular Texts. — A few out of very many
will suffice. In the texts which we shall adduce the truth of
native depravity is mostly given as an implication of their contents,
rather than in the form of direct statement. There are indeed but
few proof-texts of the latter class, but there are very many of the
former. The proof in the former is just as conclusive as in the
latter.
" And Grod saw that the wickedness of man was great in the
THE SOURCE cartli, and that every imagination of the thoughts of
OF SIN. his heart was only evil continually." "For the imag-
ination of man's heart is evil from his youth." ' In both texts
there is reference to the great wickedness which preceded the flood
and jDrovoked its judicial infliction. This wickedness in all its
forms of violence and crime is traced to its source in the heart of
man, and to the evil tendency of its incipient impulses, its earliest
and most elementary activities. Such an account is rational and
' Gen. vi, 5 ; viii, 21.
PROOFS OF NATIVE DEPRAVITY. 447
sufficient only with an inclination to evil which is at once the char-
acteristic and the proof of native depravity.
"Who can bring a clean thing out of an unclean ? not one."
"^ What is man, that he should be clean ? and he which fountain and
is born of a woman, that he should be righteous ? " ^ stream.
The first text may be taken as proverbial. Its principle is that
every thing inherits the quality of its source: the stream, the
quality of the fountain; the fruit, the quality of the tree. From a
corrupt source there can be no pure issue. The principle applies to
man. The fountain of the race was corrujoted by sin, and deprav-
ity flows down the stream of human life. This accounts for the
evil tendencies of human nature. The second text illustrates the
principle of the first, with special application to man. " What is
man, that he should be clean ? and he which is born of a woman,
that he should be righteous ?" Each man inherits the moral state V
of the race, and hence is corrupt in his nature because the race is )
corrupt. Hence the appetence for evil, the relish for sin, the drink-
ing iniquity like water. '^
" Behold, I was shapen in iniquity; and in sin did my mother
conceive me." "The wicked are estranged from the testimony
womb: they go astray as soon as they are born, speak- ^^ david.
ing lies."^ With a fully awakened conscience, David came to a
very deep sense of his recent sins, and in very earnest words expressed
his consciousness of their enormity. Only the utmost intensity of
expression could do any justice to the reality. Below these actual
sins he found the corruption of his inner nature; and hence his
earnest prayers: "Wash me thoroughly from mine iniquity, and
cleanse me from my sin." " Purge me with hyssop, and I shall be
clean: wash me, and I shall be whiter than snow." In this intense
introspection he carries the view of inner corruption back to the
very inception of his existence. It would be easy to call this an
exaggeration springing from the whelming intensity of feeling, but
we should thus destroy this profound and instructive lesson of pen-
itence, for we might in like manner account its whole expression an
exaggeration. The truth of native depravity is clearly given in the
first text cited in this paragraph, for otherwise there is nothing to
justify or even to render permissible the use of its words. The
second text further expresses the same truth. The only rational
sense of a moral estrangement from our birth, and a straying into
sin as soon as we are born, lies in the truth of native depravity.
This is the only sense consistent with the Scriptures and the rela-
tive facts. The words cannot mean an actual sinning from one's
' Job xiv, 4 ; xv, 14. ''Job xv, 16, 'Psa. li, 5 ; Iviii, 3.
448 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
/birth, and therefore must mean a native depravity, the incijoient
activities of which tend to evil. This is the only consistent inter-
pretation.
"What then ? are we better than they ? No, in no wise: for we
luivc before proved both Jews and Gentiles, that they are
OK PAl"!.. .... .
all under sm; as it is written, There is none righteous,
no, not one: there is none that nnderstandeth, there is none that
MKTHoi) OF seeketh after God. They are all gone out of the way,
PAUL'S AR- they are together become unprofitable; there is none that
doeth good, no, not one."' In this strong passage
Paul sums up and applies the arguments conducted in the first
and second chapters. He had proved in the first the universal
sinfulness of the Gentiles, and in the second the universal sinful-
ness of the Jews. This proof he assumes in the passage just cited.
Instances of personal righteousness, even many such, are entirely
consistent with his j)osition of universal sinfulness. The ruling
purpose of his argument requires this consistency. As sin is uni-
versal there can be no personal righteousness simply by the law;
but righteousness is still possible through faith in Christ. All are
sinners, but many are thus saved from sin. While many are
righteous through grace, it is still true that none are righteous on
the footing of nature. Paul confirms his position of universal sin-
fulness by a citation from the Psalms,* as we see in the passage
now in hand. These texts in the Psalms refer directly to the great
wickedness just preceding the flood. St. Paul, however, is not at-
tempting a mere parallelism between widely separate ages, but is
maintaining the sinfulness of man in all ages. This is the presup-
position and requirement of his doctrine of justification by faith.
Such a universality of sin must mean, as we shall more fully point
out, a native inclination or tendency to sin. The argument of
Paul in proving the universality of sin is replete with the evidences
of such native tendency.
There are many texts which incidentally but strongly convey the
THE sExsK OF scnsc of a disordered state and evil tendency of man-
MAXY TEXTS, klud. Wc cltc from a collection by Mr. Watson.
"'Madness is in the heart of the sons of men, while they live'
(Eccl. ix, 3). 'But they like moi have transgressed the covenant'
(Hos. vi, 7). 'If ?/e, being evil, know how to give good gifts unto
your children ' (Matt, vii, 11). ' Thou savorest not the things that
be of God, but the things that be of men ' (Matt, xvi, 23). 'Are
ye not carnal, and walk as mex ?' (1 Cor. iii, 3.) The above texts
are to be considered as specimens of the manner in which the sacred
' Eom. iii, 9-13. « Psa. xiv, 1-3 ; liii, 1-3.
PROOFS OF NATIVE DEPRAVITY. 449
writers speak of the subject rather than as approaching to an enu-
meration of the passages in which the same sentiments are found in
great variety of expression, and which are adduced on various occa-
sions." ' They fully give the sense of a native quality of evil in
man.
2. Tmpnssihility of Righteousness and Life ty Law. — Full obedi-
ence, or the fulfillment of all duty, must be sufficient
' •' FULL OBEDI-
for both righteousness and life. If the fulfillment of ence suffi-
all duty is not sufficient for personal righteousness ^'^''*^"
there must be some diviue requirement for righteousness above
one's whole dutm This, however, cannot be, for any requirement
for righteousness must take its place as one's duty. The ful-
fillment of all duty must be the very reality of personal righteous-
ness. Such righteousness must be sufficient for life — life in the
blessedness of the divine favor. If it should be objected that there
is no merit in obedience, it may suffice to answer, that the divine
economy of reward is not commercial in its ground. Full obedience
must be sufficient for personal righteousness and life, for otherwise
sin and death would be an original necessity with all moral intel-
ligences.
Yet neither righteousness nor life is possible to man by deeds of
law. This is the doctrine of Paul, and underlies his ^oxe thus
doctrine of justification. He finds all men guilty before obedient.
God, and concludes: '"^Therefore by the deeds of the law there
shall no flesh be justified in his sight."" This is not because the
fulfillment of duty is not sufficient for personal righteousness, but
because the obedience is wanting and all have sinned. " For if
righteousness come by the law, then Christ is dead in vain."'
The very necessity for the atonement in Christ was the impossibility
of righteousness under law. " For if there had been a law given
which could have given life, verily righteousness should have been
by the law."* But the law could not give life because it could not
give righteousness ; so that neither righteousness nor life is possible
by deeds of law.
Why this impossibility ? It must lie in the impossibility of full
obedience to the law of duty ; for we have previously proof of a
shown the sufficiency of such obedience for both right- mokal lapse.
eousness and life. We do not mean an absolute impossibility, but
an impossibility without the grace of redemption and the office of
the Holy Spirit in the ministry of that grace. Why such an im-
possibility ? Either the law of duty must be above the ability of
' Theological Institutes, vol. ii, p. 71. ^ Rom. iii, 20.
'Gal. iiJ21. ■• Gal. iii, 21.
30
450 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
man as originally constituted, or he must be in a state of moral
lapse and disability. The former alternative must be excluded; for
a primary law of duty above the power of obedience would involve
the necessity of sin. AVe must accept the alternative of a moral
lapse, with its moral disabilities. This is the truth of native
depravity.
3. NecesfiUy for Spiritual Regeneration. — The ground of this
argument is furnished in the doctrine of regeneration as set forth
by Christ in his lesson to Nicodemus.' The passage is familiar,
and we may omit its formal citation. The construction of the
argument requires little more than an analysis of ^e passage and a
grouping of its leading facts.
The nature and necessity of regeneration are set forth in con-
NATURF.oFTiiE ncctiou. " Exccpt a man be born again, he cannot
NECESSITY. gee the kingdom of God." " Except a man be born of
water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of
heaven." Regeneration is an innet renovation, a purification of
the inner nature. This is its sense as signified by the water of
baptism, and by the agency of the Holy Spirit, through whose
gracious power the work is wrought. We may trace the idea of
this work through the Scriptures, and, while we find it under many
forms of expression, we find in all this deeper meaning of an inward
renewal and purification. Its necessity to our salvation is declared
in the most positive manner. Without it we cannot enter into the
kingdom of heaven.
The ground of this necessity lies in a native qiTality of our nature.
GROUND OF THE ^liis Is thc clcar sense of the words of Christ. After
NECESSITY. the repeated assertion of the necessity of regeneration
to salvation, he adds : " That which is born of the flesh is flesh ;
and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. Marvel not that I
said unto thee. Ye must be born again." Flesh cannot here be
taken in any mere physical sensev Such a sense could neither
express the necessity for spiritual regeneration nor allow its possi-
bility. The two ideas are utterly incongruous. Through regenera-
tion the spiritual quality replaces the fleshly quality. That which
is born of thc Spirit is spirit — in the sense of moral quality. Hence
the regenerate, while still physically in the flesh, are in moral qual-
ity or subjective state no longer in the flesh but in the Spirit, or
the spiritual state produced by the Spirit in the work of regenera-
tion.' It is thus clear that flesh find spirit stand in contrast, the
former meaning a depraved state, the latter, a renewed and holy
state. This interpretation is confirmed by the further contrast
• John iii, 3-7. ' Rom. viii, 9 ; Gal. v, 24, 25.
PROOFS OF NATIVE DEPRAVITY. 451
which the Scriptures draw between the flesh and the Spirit, or the
fleshly mind and the spiritual mind, and between the works of the
flesh and the fruits of the Spirit.' We thus have the sense of flesh
as our Lord used the term in his doctrine of regeneration. It must
mean a depraved state, a corrupt nature.
The proof of native depravity is right at hand : " That which is
born of the flesh is flesh." On the ground of Scripture this one
proof is conclusive.
In the proofs of native depravity thus far adduced it is manifest
that the question is not a merely speculative one, but ^ fundament-
one that is fundamental in Christian theology. We ^^ doctrine.
have seen that it underlies the necessity for an atonement, ^or justi-
fication by faith, and for spiritual regeneration. These are distinct-
ive and cardinal truths of Christianity. Native depravity is the
presupposition of each and all. Without this deeper truth there is
no requirement of any one. If these doctrines are true, the fallen
state of man must be a truth. " If he is not a depraved, undone
creature, what necessity for so wonderful a Restorer and Saviour as
the Son of God ? If he is not enslaved to sin, why is he redeemed
by Jesus Christ? If he is not polluted, why must he be washed in
the blood of the immaculate Lamb? If his soul is not disordered,
what occasion is there for such a divine Physician? If he is not
helpless and miserable, why is he personally invited to secure the
assistance and consolations of the Holy Spirit? And, in a word, if
he is not 'born in sin,^ why is a 'new birth ' so absolutely necessary
that Christ declares, with the most solemn asseverations, ' Without
it no man can see the kingdom of God ? ""^
II. Pkoof iisr THE Peevalence of Sin".
1. Universality of Actual Sin. — Both sacred and secular history
disclose the universal prevalence of sin. Of course it is not pre-
tended that every person of the- race is brought distinctly into view
and disclosed in the actual sinfulness of his life. This is not neces-
sary to the utmost certainty of universal sinning. The nature op
universality is a warranted generalization from the uni- the proof.
formity in observed individuals. This is the method of science.
In no department of nature is it thought necessary to observe and
test every specimen or individual in order to the generalization and
certainty of the science. After proper observation, the classification
is never disturbed by the discovery of new instances so dissimilar as
to refuse a scientific incorporation. The method is thoroughly valid
in application to man, Now in all the disclosures of history, in all
lEom. viii, 1-13 ; Gal. v, 16, 17, 19-34. '^Fletcher : Appeal, part i.
452 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
the moral and religious consciousness which has received a frank
and open expression, a sinless man has not appeared. Of course we
except the Son of man. However, he is not strictly an exception,
because his unique character will not allow his human classification
simply as a man ; and he is as really distinct in his sinlessness as in
his unique personality. There is no human exception. It is not
GOOD LivKs NO ^ssumcd that all are equally sinful, nor that each is
DISPROOF. given to the commission of all sins. Nor is it denied
that there have been many good men. The grace of redemption
and the work of the Holy Spirit, operative in all ages and among all
peoples, have not been without result. Many a soul, taking hold
upon this divine help, has been lifted up into a thoroughly good life.
Perhaps for the want of the fuller light of heavenly truth this has
often been done without full consciousness of the doing. But take
the testimony of such men, the truest and best of the race, and not
one of them will say that his life has been without sin. No man
could claim an entirely sinless life without profound offense to the
common moral judgment, and that judgment would pronounce such
profession itself a sin. The universality of actual sin is so certain
that we need not the details of universal history to confirm it.
The Scriptures are in full accord with the testimony of history.
TESTIMONY OF "^^^ cxpliclt uttcrauces of a few texts may suffice.
SCRIPTURE. " For there is no man that sinneth not.'" This must
mean, at least, that at some time sin is a fact in every life. " They
are all gone aside, they are all together become filthy: there is none
that doeth good, no, not one. " ^ Instances of salvation from sin
are entirely consistent with these words, but they cannot mean less
than the universality of sin. David prays to God: "And enter
not into judgment with thy servant : for in thy sight shall no man
living be justified."' This is the very doctrine of Paul, that no
man can be justified by the deeds of the law, because all have
sinned. " For we have before proved both Jews and Gentiles, that
they are all under sin." ''For all have sinned, and come short of
the glory of God."* As previously shown, this universality of
actual sin underlies the Pauline doctrine of justification. As all
have sinned, all are under condemnation; for it is the function of
the law to condemn the guilty, not to justify or forgive. This is
the necessity for the atonement, and for justification by faith in
Christ. Paul thus combines the universality of sin with his great
doctrines of atonement and justification. In its certainty it stands
with these doctrines. "If we say that we have no sin, we deceive
ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, he is
' 1 Kings viii, 46. ''Psa. xiv, 3. "Psa. cxliii, 2. ^Kom. iii, 9, 23.
PROOFS OF NATIVE DEPRAVITY. 453
faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all
unrighteousness. If we say that we have not sinned, we make him
a liar, and his word is not in us. " ' Again, one may be righteous
before God, right with the law, and free from the guilt of sin, but
only through a gracious forgiveness of sin. This is a necessity with
all, because all have sinned. On this fact the testimony of Scrip-
ture is above question.
^. The Proof of an Evil Tendency in Man. — Natural tendency
is manifest in a uniformity of results. ^' We obtain a notion op
notion of such a thing as tendency no other way than tendency.
by observation; and we can observe nothing but events; and it is the
commonness or constancy of events that gives us a notion of tend-
ency in all cases. Thus we judge of tendencies in the natural
world. Thus we judge of the 'tendencies or propensities of nature
in minerals, vegetables, animals, rational and irrational creatures.'^"
This is the proper method of reaching the notion of a tendency of
nature, and the principle so reached is most certain. There must
be a tendency of nature under uniformities of action. This is a
valid and necessary principle of science. It underlies physics, and
chemistry, and natural history. Without it these sciences would be
impossible ; and their practical utilities would be impossible.
The same principle is thoroughly valid for the habits of human
life. As in the case of all other things open to scieijtific the same for
treatment, so the tendencies of human nature must be "uman life.
determined according to uniformities of human action. Here, then,
is a uniformity in sinful action. All have sinned. With all the differ-
ences of temperament, social condition, education, moral training,
and religious creed, there is this uniformity of action. Whether we
view man as a species, or in the multitude of human personalities,
this universality of sin is the proof of an evil tendency of his nature.
"^For it alters not the case in the least, as to the evidence of tend-
ency, whether the subject of the constant event be an individual, or
a nature and kind. Thus, if there be a succession of trees of the
same sort, proceeding one from another, from the beginning of the
world, growing in all conditions, soils, and climates, and otherwise
in (as it were) an infinite variety of circumstances, all bearing ill
fruit, it as much proves the nature and tendency of the hind as if
it were only one individual tree, that had remained from the begin-
ning of the world, had often been transplanted into different soils,
etc., and had continued to bear only bad fruit. So, if there be a
particular family, which, from generation to generation, and
through every remove to innumerable different countries and places
1 1 John i, 8-10. ^g^^ards : Works, vol. ii, p. 318.
464 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
of abode, all died of a consumption, or all ran distracted, or all
murdered themselves, it would be as much au evidence of the
tendency of something in the nature or constitution of that race as
it would be of the tendency of something in the nature or state of
an individual, if one person had lived all the time, and some re-
markable event had often appeared to him, which he had been the
agent or subject of from year to year, and from age to age, contin-
ually and without fail."' On such valid principles the universality
of actual sin is conclusive of an evil tendency in human nature.
This evil tendency is the characteristic fact and the proof of native
depravity.
3. Only Rational Account of Universal Sin. — In order to invali-
date the argument for native depravity from the universality of
actual sin, it has been attempted on other grounds to account for
that universality, but without success. It will suffice to consider
the chief attempts of the kind.
One attempt is, to account for the universality of sin on the
NO ACCOUNT ground of evil example and education. In any proper
IN EVIL EXAM- usc for such a purpose, the distinction between bad
^^^' example and bad education is not very thorough, indeed
is but slight. However, we have no polemical interest in disputing
any distinction which the case will allow. Bad example and bad
education are both mighty forces in human life. Many minds are thus
perverted, many hearts corrupted, many souls led into sin. But
before they can even be assumed to account for the universality of
sin there must be conceded them a universal presence and evil influ-
ence ; for otherwise they could not account for the universal result.
But bad example and bad education, every-where present and oper-
ative for evil, are simply forms of the universal sin, and therefore
must themselves be accounted for. As a part of the universal sin,
they must be valueless for any account of that universality. To
attempt it is simply the fallacy of making a thing account for itself:
worse than that ; it is the egregious fallacy of making the part of a
thing account for the whole.
There is another decisive view of this question. "While the great
power of bad example and education is conceded, it
POWER OK i i . '
EVIL Kx- should not be overlooked that such power, like all prac-
AMPLE. i\Qii\. forces, is conditioned by certain responsive suscep-
tibilities or inclinations in man. Without the responsive sensibili-
ties the mightiest practical forces would be utterly powerless. There
must be plasticity of substance as well as molding force, else there
can be no casting of any form. For the molding power of any
' Edwards : Works, vol. ii, p. 319.
PROOFS OF NATIVE DEPRAVITY. 455
form of example or education there must be a plasticity of our nat-
ure which will readily yield to its influence. If bad example and
education have such power over human life that they may be claimed
to account for the universality of sin, there must be susceptibilities
and tendencies of human nature which readily respond to their
influence. Such susceptibilities and tendencies are possible only with
an evil bias or inclination. Such evil bias or inclination is the
characteristic fact and the proof of native depravity. Thus the
great power of bad example and bad education, through which it is
attempted to invalidate a leading proof of native depravity, becomes
itself a proof of that depravity.
Again, it is maintained that free-will, without any evil tendency
of human nature, sufficiently accounts for the universal- no account in
ity of actual sin. If this position is valid, the argument frke-will.
for native depravity from that universality is answered. The main
support of this position is brought from the case of Adam in the
primitive sin. Without any evil bias, and against the tendencies
of his nature to the good, Adam sinned purely through the free-
dom of volition. Therefore all may sin, and do sin, in the exer-
cise of a like freedom. This is the argument. Dr. tatlor'sar-
Taylor puts it thus: "Adam^s nature, it is allowed, gpment.
was very far from being sinful ; yet he sinned. And, therefore,
the common doctrine of original sin is no more necessary to ac-
count for the sin that has been or is in the world than it is to
account for Adam's sin. . . . Thus their argument from the wick-
edness of mankind, to i^rove a sinful and corrupt nature, must in-
evitably and irrecoverably fall to the ground . " '
From the instance of Adam one might in this manner prove the
abstract possibility of universal sin from mere freedom without
of volition, but could not thus rationally account for validity.
its actuality. A single free action may easily be induced without
any natural tendency or disposition. We often recognize individual
acts of men as quite apart from their known character and habit of life.
To account for such acts we do not require any permanent tendencj''
or disposition. But to account for a habit of life, whether good
or evil, we do require an inner tendency or disposition in accord
Avith it. The case is infinitely stronger when we go from one man
to all men, and especially when we go from a single action of one
man to a uniformity of action in all men. We can account for a
single act without any natural tendency or disposition thereto, but
cannot account for the habit of even a single life without such
tendency or disposition. How much less can we account for the
' Cited by Edwards : Works, vol. ii, p. 361.
456 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
universality of actual Bin without a tendency to evil in human
nature. The fallacy of Taylor's argument thus appears. A single
act of sin gives no account of universal sin, and is utterly powerless
against the proof of an evil tendency derived from that universality.
Native depravity is the only rational account of universal sin, and
its reality is thus proved.'
4. Concerning Natural Virtues. — It is claimed that there are
many natural virtues; and on this ground an objection is brought
against the doctrine of native depravity. We do not think the
objection valid, and therefore have no interest in disputing the
fact of such virtues. However, they must not be exaggerated or
counted for more than they are. There are natural virtues — virtues
which we may call natural in distinction from such as spring from
spiritual regeneration, though we do not concede their purely
NATURAL natural ground. They appear in personal character,
VIRTUES. in domestic life, in social life, in civil life, in the
many forms of business. All along the centuries, men and
women, without any profession of a regenerate life, yet of un-
questionable purity, uprightness, and integrity of character, have
appeared: some with natures gentle and lovable, and lives full
of sympathy and kindness; others, strong and heroic, but true
in all things. A doctrine of native depravity which cannot
admit the consistency of such virtues with itself must be an exag-
geration, and any inference which that inconsistency warrants goes
to the disproof, not of the true doctrine, but of a form of it which
exaggeration has made erroneous. There is no doctrine of native
depravity in the Scriptures which renders the truth of such virtues
inconsistent with itself. Native depravity does not make human
nature demonian. It is not irredeemably bad. Life begins with
evil tendencies, but also with activities of the moral and religious
nature Avhich act as a check upon these tendencies. Monsters of wick-
edness are a growth. Instances of utter badness from early life are
comparatively few, and are properly regarded as abnormal. The
Scriptures every-where recognize the moral and religious susceptibil-
ities of men, except as they may be stifled by a vicious habit of life.
In the absence of a true spiritual life with so many, natural virtues
NKCEssARY IN ^rc ncccssary to the domestic, social, and civil forms of
HUMAN LIFE, luimau llfc which actually exist, and which we must
think to be in the order of the divine providence. Their providen-
tial purpose implies a capacity in human nature for the necessary
natural virtues. The Scriptures contain no doctrine of native
depravity inconsistent with these facts.
' Edwards : Works, vol. ii, pp. 361-365.
PROOFS OF NATIVE DEPRAVITY. 457
We Lave not conceded to such natural virtues a purely natural
ground. We called them natural because actual in sourckofnat-
human life without spiritual regeneration. The fallen ^^^^ virtues.
race is also a redeemed race, and a measure of grace is given to
every man, and remains witli him as a helpful influence, unless
forfeited by a vicious habit of life. Human nature is not just what
it would be if left to the unrestricted consequence of the Adamic
fall. It is not so left. The helping grace of redemption does not await
our spiritual regeneration, but a measure is given to every man, that
we might be capable of the forms of life providentially intended for
us; most of all, that we might be lifted up to a capacity for the moral
and religious probation in which we are all placed. We thus have
the true source of what we call natural virtues, and a source en-
tirely consistent with tlie doctrine of native depravity. Further,
the many providential agencies for the moral and religious improve-
ment of mankind have ever co-operated with the helping grace of
redemption. The virtues necessary to the providential forms of
human life are thus nurtured and strengthened. Finally, these
natural virtues are mostly of an instinctive character, spontaneous
to our nature, and survive all changes and conditions, except that
of an utter personal debasement.
They may exist and fulfill their necessary offices in the providen-
tial forms of human life, not only in the absence of a without true
true spiritual state, but with the presence of an evil state, spirituamty.
Their functions are fulfilled without any vitalizing moral principle,
without any sense of duty to God. They have in themselves no
strictly moral or religious quality, and can be carried up into a true
moral and religious sphere only by the incoming of a true spiritual
life, which subordinates all the powers and activities of the soul
to itself and consecrates all to God and duty. These natural
virtues therefore may be called virtues only in the most nominal
sense. In themselves they are not virtues. And as they may exist,
not only in the absence of a true spiritual life, but with aversion to
such a life, with propensity to evil, and with actual evil, they give
no proof against the doctrine of native depravity.
III. Further Proofs of a Fallen State.
Under this head we group a few facts which are common to the
present state of man, but inconsistent with his primitive state.
The idea of a primitive state of holiness and happiness is at once a
scriptural and a rational idea. Paradise, with its blessings, its
freedom from wearying toil, from suffering and death, with its open
communion with God and joy in his presence, seems a fitting estate
458 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
for primitive man, morally constituted as he was, and fashioned
in the image of God. The absence of such an estate and the pres-
ence of strongly discordant facts give proof of a fallen state. We
note a few of these facts.
1. Manifold Ills of Human Life. — The present state of man
may be characterized as one of frailty and suffering. This is the
Scripture view, and the common experience, as voiced in many a
lament of weariness and pain. Man is born to trouble, as the sparks
fly upward. He is of few days, and full of trouble.' The compar-
ison of his life is not with strong and abiding things, but with the
frail and the quickly vanishing. We are like the grass which flour-
ishes in the morning and in the evening is cut down;^ like the
flower of the field which perishes under the passing wind;^ like a
vapor, appearing for a little while, and then vanishing away.'' Such
a life of frailty and trouble has no accordance with the primitive
Btate of man, and strongly witnesses to his fallen condition.
3. Mortality of the Race. — Human death is the consequence of
Adamic sin. Death preceded the Adamic fall, and from the begin-
ning reigned over all living orders. Nor was there in the physio-
logical constitution of man any natural exemption from such a
consequence. In this constitution he was too much like the higher
animal orders not to be naturally subject to the same law. Yet he
was provisionally immortal — that is, he had the privilege of a prov-
A PROVISIONAL Idcutial exemption from death on the condition of obe-
iMMOKTALiTY. (jiencc to tlic diviue will. This appears in the narrative
of the probation and fall of man, and also in the account of the origin
and prevalence of human death. The fruit of the tree of life, orig-
inally open to the use of man, signifies a provisional immortality.
Expulsion from that tree was a deprivation of this privilege, and
the subjection of man to death. ^ It is the sense of this passage
that human death came by sin. What is thus given in an implicit
mode is elsewhere openly declared.
By one man sin came into the world, and death by sin; and
through the universality of sin came universal death.'
While the universality of death is thus connected with
the universality of sin, it is yet true that the common mortality is
consequent to the Adamic sin and fall. " By the trespass of the
one the many died." " By the trespass of the one, death reigned
through one." '' In Adam all die."' How shall we explain the
universal mortality as consequent to the sin and fall of Adam? The
' Job V, 7 ; xiv, 1. * Psa. xc, 5, 6. 'Psa. ciii, 15, 16 ; Isa. xl, fr-8.
* Jamea iv, 14. ' Gen. iii, 2^-24. * Eom. v, 13.
' Rom. V, 15, 17 ; 1 Cor. xv, 23.
PROOFS OF NATIVE DEPRAVITY. 459
assumption of an immediate effect upon the physiological consti-
tution of man could not answer for an interpretation, because the
assumed effect is purely of a physical character and, therefore,
would be unnatural to the cause. There could be no such imme-
diate physical effect. The theory which accounts physical death a
penal retribution, judicially inflicted upon all men on the ground
of a common participation in the sin of Adam, is beset with very
great difficulties. Yet, as we have previously shown, the common
mortality is in some way consequent to that sin. The subjection
of Adam to mortality and death was effected through his expulsion
from the tree of life, and the withdrawment of that special prov-
idential agency through which, on the condition of obedience, he
would have been preserved in life. These were penal inflictions on
the ground of sin. In consequence of this subjection of Adam to
death, mortality is entailed upon the race. The deprivation of the
privilege and means of immortality which he suffered on account
of sin descends upon his race. There is this connection of the
common mortality with the sin of Adam. In this sense death
reigns through his offense and in him all die.
There must be some reason for this consequence; some reason
why the race of Adam should be denied the original „„.,^„ ^ „
*' _ ° RKASON FOR
privilege of immortality with which he was favored, the umvik-
If each one begins life with the primitive holiness, why ^^^ dkath.
should he not have this privilege? With such a nature he would
be morally fitted for the primitive probation. It is j)lain, however,
that he is not thus fitted. The universality of sin proves his un-
fitness. The impossibility of righteousness and life by deeds cf
law, as maintained by Paul, proves the same fact. In consequence
of the sin and fall of Adam every man has suffered a moral de-
terioration which disqualifies him for an economy of works, and
requires for him an economy of redemption. Such an economy ha3
been divinely instituted for the race. The privilege of immortal-
ity belonged to the former ; mortality, with the provision of a
resurrection, belongs to the latter. ' This change of economy,
rendered necessary only by a deterioration of man's moral nature,
proves his native depravity. The common mortality, as thus
mediated by the common depravity, is, in turn, the jjroof of this
depravity.
3. Small Success of Moral and Religious Agencies. — Every-
where there are convictions of duty, with the activities of con-
science approving its fulfillment and reprehending its means and
neglect or violation. This is the case even where there results.
is little exterior light for the moral judgment. Every-where such
460 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
convictions of duty are embodied in public opinion, and often
in statutory law, with the sanction of rewards for the restraint of
vice and the support of virtue. In the many religions of the world,
even with their many errors, there are lessons of moral duty. Phi-
losophy and poetry have joined in the support of the good against
the evil. After due allo\vance for the errors of moral judgment and
the elements of evil in legislation and religion, in philosophy and
poetry, there is still a large sum of moral agency which, with a
responsive nature in man, must have produced a large fruitage of
good. The fruitage has been small because the nature of man has
strongly resisted these agencies. Every-where the common life has
been far below its moral and religious lessons.
Like facts appear under the more direct agencies of Providence
in the interest of morality and religion. Such agencies, often in
an open supernatural mode, appear through all the history of the
race. We see them in the beginning of that history. God is pres-
ent with men; present with precepts and promises, with warnings
against sin, with blessings for obedience and punishment for dis-
obedience. The evil tendencies of men are stronger than these
moral restraints. The tide of iniquity rises above all barriers, and
so floods the world as to provoke the divine retribution in its de-
sTRENGTH OF structlon. Agalust all the force of this fearful lesson
EVIL TEXDEN- iulqulty soon again prevailed, and so widely as to pro-
voke again the divine retribution. Later history is
replete wdth moral and religious agencies. We see them in the
history of Abraham, in the miracles of Moses and the divine legis-
lation through his ministry. God was with the prophets, and
through his Spirit their words were mighty. Through all these
centuries of Jewish history such moral and religious agencies, often
in a supernatural mode, were in active operation. With a respon-
sive moral and religious nature in man, a prevailing and perma-
nent obedience to the divine will would have been secured. There
was no such result. The frequent revolts and rebellions, some-
times in the very presence o^ the most imposing forms of the di-
vine manifestation, witness, not only to the absence of such a nat-
ure, but also to the presence of a nature actively propense to evil
and strongly resistant of all these moral and religious agencies."
With the advent of the Messiah came the fuller light of the
THE GOSPEL ^o^pcl. Li tlic Hfc and miracles and lessons of Christ
OETEN FuiiT- aud thc ministry of his apostles moral and religious
agencies rose to their highest form. Instead of a ready
response to such truth and grace, again there is resistance. Like
' Exod. xxxii, 9, 33 ; xxxiii, 3 ; Isa, xlviii, 3-5 ; Acts vii, 51-53,
PROOFS OF NATIVE DEPRAVITY. 461
resistance has continued through all the Christian centuries. Nor
has this resistance widely taken the form of infidelity, which so
bars the soul against the moral forces of the Gospel. The signifi-
cant fact is its prevalence with so many who accept the deepest
verities of Christianity. With the admission of such truths, only
a native aversion to a true religious life could in so many instances
void their constraining force. In all this resistance to the moral
and religious agencies of Providence, and the comparatively small
results of good, proof is given of the truth of native depravity.'
4. llie Common Spiritual Apathy. — This apathy is a manifest
fact in human life. It is the mental state of the many. Why is
this widely prevalent apathy? Men care for secular good. Self-
interest is a potent force in human life. Why are its energies
given to mere secular good, while spiritual and eternal interests are
so much neglected? Why so much earnest service of mammon in
preference to the service of God? Men consent to the paramount
duties of religion, and to its infinitely momentous interests, and
promise them attention, but slumber again, and slumber on, heed-
less of all the voices of life and death and the entreating appeals
of the divine love. Such spiritual apathy cannot be normal to a
soul made in the image of God and for a heavenly destiny. It
evinces a moral state which has its only account in the truth of
native depravity.
' Fletcher : Works, vol. iii, pp. 302-305 ; Edwards : Works, vol. ii, pp.
3-18-361.
462 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
CHAPTER VIII.
ORIGIN OF DEPRAVITY,
The origin of depravity as a fact, and the ground or law of its
entailment upon the race, are distinct questions and open to sepa-
rate answers. There is not unanimity respecting either. Nor does
the answer to the first question necessarily determine tlie answer to
the second. It is better, therefore, to treat them separately.
I. Adamic Origin.
1. Limitations of the Question of Origin. — These limitations
arise from certain facts of depravity. One is, that it is native — a
moral state in which we are_born. Hence it cannot have its origin
in any thing subsequent to our birth. "We thus see the error of
accounting it to any such thing as evil example or education, or to
the influence of environment. Such things may act upon our evil
nature and quicken its tendencies into earlier and stronger activity,
but cannot be the source of our depravity, because, while it is na-
tive, they can affect us only in our actual life. Another fact is
that depravity is universal. Hence it cannot arise from any local
or temporary source. The true source must be common to all
men. Finally, depravity itself is intrinsically the same and one in
all. Therefore its origin must be one, not many. The present
thinking, the best philosophical thinking, forbids an unnecessary
multijjlication of causes, and for such a uniform and universal fact
as native depravity could allow only one source.'
2. Origin in the Aclamic Fall. — The conditions of limitation re-
specting the origin of depravity are all met in the Adamic rela-
tions of the race. This is not the only case in which they are all
met, but it is the most reasonable account of the common deprav-
ity, and the source to which the Scriptures lead us. They are all
equally met in our relation to physical nature as contemporary with
our birth, as common to all, and the same for all. The idea of a
NOT IN MAT- physical origin of moral evil, and of the evil tendencies
TER. of human nature, has widely prevailed. It is in the
vast system of Brahmanism, and in the Greek philosophy. It
flourished in the Gnosticism of the early Christian centuries. Its
' Dwight : Theology, sermon xxxii.
ORIGIN OF DEPRAVITY. 463
tendencies are always evil: to sensuality in one direction, and to
extreme asceticism in the other. - If matter is intrinsically evil
and the inevitable source of corruption to the soul, then such was
man's state as originally created, and there is for him no deliver-
ance in the present life. Such facts are not reconcilable with any
true idea of God. But as a heresy in Christian theology the
physical origin of moral evil is only a matter of history, and needs
no present refutation. The conditions of limitation
^ ... NOT IN GOD.
respecting the origin of depravity are also met m the
relations of God to the soul. It could not be said that doctrinal
opinion has never implicated tlie divine agency in the origin of
depravity — not, indeed, by an immediate constitution of a corrupt
nature in primitive man, but mediately by a determination of the
Adamic fall. Such determination must bo an implication of supra-
lapsarian Calvinism. Happily, supralapsarianism is now almost
wholly a matter of history. Neither by an original constitution of
human nature, nor by any agency which determined the Adamic
fall, could God be the author of such an evil as human depravity.
His holiness and goodness declare it an absolute impossibility.
The Adamic origin of depravity is thus rendered strongly origin in
probable. The three relations which we have named as ^"^m.
meeting the limitations of the question complete the circle of such
relations in even thinkable sources. It follows that, as the origin
of depravity cannot be either in physical nature or in God, it must
be in the Adamic fall.
3. Transmissible Effects of Adam's Sin. — The effect of Adam's
sin in himself was the corruption of his own nature. No one can
sin without detriment to his subjective moral state. The higher
the state of holiness, the deeper the moral deterioration. There
was the deeper consequence of evil in the case of Adam, who was
created in holiness. Besides this more direct effect of his sin he
suffered a deprivation of the Holy Spirit, whose presence gave to
his subjective holiness its highest form. As previously shown, the
consequence of this deprivation was the deeper depravation of his
moral nature. The corruption of nature which Adam thus suffered
must have been transmitted to his offspring. This lawoftrans-
result is determined by a law of nature, and as fixed a mission.
law as nature reveals. There is no need to assume that this law of
transmission must rule in the case of such slight changes as may
occur in the mere accidents of parental character, but it must rule
in the case of so profound a change in the subjective moral state.
There is no reference to this law in the case of either Cain or Abel,
but there is a reference in the instance of Seth in that he was
464 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
begotten in the likeness and image of his father.' The transmis-
sion of the Adamic likeness, even in his fallen state, is thus fully
recognized. In this there is reason for us to find the origin of de-
pravity in the Adamic fall.
4. Secular Consequences of the Adamic Fall. — In consequence of
the Adamic sin and fall the race is involved in physical suffering
and death. The record of such results is clearly given in the Script-
ures." With this text we may collate others in which the common
mortality is more definitely attributed to the Adamic fall.* With
this great fact so definitely given, we may include with it other
forms of i)hysical suffering, as expressed in the divine judgment
upon the progenitors of the race. For the present we are concerned
only with the facts of such consequences, without any respect tp
the law of their entailment. Nor is the fact itself in the least
affected by any perplexities of interpretation which the texts may
present. We may not be able to get the exact sense in which the
earth was cursed and man subjected to wearying toil. We may
think of great strength in primitive man as at once providentially
given and guarded, and also of the garden prepared for him, with
such conditions of fruitftilness as to yield an ample living without
any requirement of wearying toil. We may also think of greatly
changed conditions: a loss of strength in man, and the allotment
of new fields, no longer prepared as a garden, but hard and rough
in their primitive nature, and from which bread must be forced
in the sweat of the face. But whatever the mode of the divine
judgment upon man and the earth, it clearly conveys the sense
of physical suffering and death in consequence of the Adamic
fall.
5. Deeper Moral Consequence in Depravity. — The physical evils
which the race suffers in consequence of the Adamic fall are con-
nected with a deeper moral consequence. This connection is
specially clear in the case of death. " Wherefore, as by one man
sin entered into the world, and death by sin; and so death passed
upon all men, for that all have sinned." ■* The sense is not merely
that Adam was the first that sinned, but that in some deep sense
universal sin and death are connected with his sin and fall. We have
previously shown that universal actual sin has no rational
RESULTS OF i -^ i • j. 1
THE ADAMIC account except through the common depravity of hu-
coxNKCTioN. ^^^ nature. We may thus find the connection be-
tween the universal actual sin and the sin of Adam. The universal
actual sin has its source in the common depravity, and the common
' Gen. V, 3. " Gen. iii, 16-19. 'Rom. v, 15, 17 ; 1 Cor. xv, 21, 22.
* Eom. V, 12.
ORIGIN OF DEPRAVITY. 465
depravity lias its source in the sin of Adam. There is no other
way of accounting for the universality of actual sin through his
sin. Thus the corruption of Adam's own nature through sin be-
comes the source of the common depravit}^ There is a like con-
nection of the common mortality which is also traced to the Adamic
sin and fall. If human nature is not corrupted through the sin
of Adam Vvc should be born in the same state in which he was
created, with equal fitness for a probationary economy and the op-
portunity of immortality. Thus the universality of death in con-
sequence of the sin of Adam is mediated by the corruption of human
nature through his sin. In the physical suffering and death en-
tailed upon the race through the sin of Adam we thus see the
deeper moral consequence in depravity.
II. Law of Adamic Origik.
With agreement respecting the Adamic origin of depravity, there
are different theories respecting its ground or law. For the present
we are concerned with the statement and discrimination of these
theories. They are so fundamental in doctrinal anthropology as.
to require separate treatment.
I 1. Theory of Penal Retrihution. — In this theory depravity is a
punishment, judicially inflicted upon mankind. It is maintained
that under the providence of God so great tin evil could not befall
the race except as a punishment. xVdvocates of tho theory ma)^
often use the term original sin instead of depravity, meaning by it
not only the corruption of human nature but also its sinfulness
or demerit. However, as sinfulness is held to be intrinsic to the
depravit}''. Just as it is intrinsic to an actual sin, we need not be
careful further to notice any difference of the terms in the present
connection. If depravity is in itself sin, then the penal infliction
of depravity is the penal infliction of original sin. Nor can this-
form of sin be inflicted without the infliction of depravity. The
theory will more fully appear under the next head.
2. On the Ground of Adamic Sin. — If depravity is a punish-
ment ib must have its ground in guilt. The most rigid Calvinism
holds this principle flrmly. Any punishment without a ground in
guilt must be an injustice. The alleged guilt in this case is held
to arise from a participation in the sin of Adam, as the only pre-
cedent sin, and to an intimate connection with which the common
depravity is traced.
This is the Calviuistic theory. . It is such at least in the general
sense. On many questions there are divergences in Calviuistic
minds. There may be dissent from the present theory, but there
31
466 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
is not enough to disturb its Calvinistic position. On tliis ques-
THE cALvix- tion, Cunningham, after noting some Calvinistic dis-
isTic TiiKORY. gg^i; QY reserve, proceeds to say: ''A second class, com-
prehending the great body of Calvinistic divines, have regarded it
(the common depravity) as, in some measure and to some extent,
explained by the principle of its being.a penal infliction upon men,
resulting from the imputation to them of the guilt of Adam's
first sin." And further: "There is no view of God's actings in
this whole matter which at all accords with the actual, proved real-
ities of the case, except that which represents him in the light of
a just judge j)unishing sin — a view which implies that men's want
of original rigliteousness and the corruption of their whole nature
have a penal character, are punishments righ^ously inflicted on
account of sin. . . . And the only explanation which
GROUNDOF . .
T!iK PENAL IN- ScHpturc affords of this mysterious constitution of
FLicTioN. tilings is, that men have the guilt of Adam's first sin
imputed to them or charged against them, so as to be legally ex-
posed to the penalties which he incurred." ' On the same ques-
tion Dr. Sliedd quotes with approval from the Formula Consensus
Helvetici: "But it does not appear how hereditary corruption,
as spiritual death, could fall upon the entire human race by the
just judgment of God, unless some fault of this same human race
bringing in the penalty of that death had preceded. For the most
just God, the Judge of all the earth, punishes none but the
guilty."" While depravity is thus clearly set forth as a pun-
ishment on the ground of guilt, it is also declared in the same
Formula that the guilt which justifies the penal infliction arises
from a common iDarticipation in the sin of Adam. Dr. Shedd not
only fully indorses this view, but jolaces this Formula at the head
of all Calvinistic symbols of the sixteenth and seventeenth centu-
ries as the clearest and most scientific statement of the doctrine of
original sin in its Adamic connection.^ Here, then, in addition to
the authority of this Formula, we have the testimony of two emi-
nent Calvinistic authors, Cunningham and Shedd, who have made
the history of doctrines a special study, who are in opposition re-
specting the mode of the common participation in the guilt of
Adam's sin, who yet fully agree that Calvinism holds depravity to
be a penal retribution on the ground of such guilt.
3. Realistic and Representative Modes of Adamic Sin. — With the
assertion of a common participation in the sin of Adam, and such
a participation as justly subjects all men to the penal infliction of
' Historical Theology, vol. i, pp. 511, 526.
' History of Christian Doctrine, vol. ii, p. 160. ' Ibid., p. 157.
ORIGIN OF DEPRAVITY. 467
depravity, the question must arise as to the ground or mode of such
participation. Some answer must be given. No theory coukl con-
sent to a purely arbitrary implication of the race in the Adamic sin.
There are two alleged modes, the realistic and the representative.
The former alleges a real oneness of the race with Adam, in some
higher or lower form of realism ; the latter, a legal oneness under a
law of representation. For the present we simply state the views.
Full explication will be given with their discussion. Each is held
by its advocates to be valid in principle, and sufficient for the com-
mon guilt and j)unishment.
Calvinists divide on these modes, though the representative is for
the present the more prevalent view. The issue really division on
involves two questions: Which is the Calvinistic theory? 't"^^^- modes.
and. Which is the true theory ? Many of the older Calvinistic di-
vines alleged both modes of Adamic guilt, which fact naturally gives
rise to the first question. In the contention both parties quote the
same authors, as well they may, since said authors are on both sides.
But it is unscientific, mere jumbling, indeed, to hold both modes,
for they are in opposition and reciprocally exclusive. If both were
valid, each mode must convey to every soul of the race the whole
guilt of Adam's sin. This would make each twice as guilty as Adam
himself. It is surely enough to be thus made equally guilty. Cal-
vinistic divines are very jiroi^erly coming to hold more exclusively
to the one or the other mode.'
4. Theory of the Genetic Transmission of Depravity. — This the-
ory is based on the law of 'Hike producing like " — the uniform law
of j)ropagated life. It holds sway over the most prolonged succes-
sion of generations, and is as fixed and j^ermanent in the human
species as in any other. Under this law man is now what he was in
the earliest offspring of Adam, and what he has been through all the
intermediate generations. As in physiological constitution and
mental endowment he is thus the same, so is he the same in his
moral state. This is a state of depravity genetically transmitted
from the fallen and depraved progenitors of the race. Such is the
account of the Adamic origin of the common depravity on the
theory of genetic transmission.
5. Doctrinal Distinction of the Two Theories. — It should be re-
membered here that the theory of penal retribution, which accounts
the common depravity a punishment on the ground of a common
' On tlie realistic side, Shedd : History of Christian Doctrine, vol. ii, pp. 76-
93 ; Dogmatic Theology, vol. ii, pp. 42-48, 181-192 ; Baird : Elohim, Revealed,
chap. xi. On the representative side, Princeton Essays, First Series, pp. 114-
167 ; Wallace : Representative Responsibility.
468 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
participation in the sin of Adam, is but one theor}^, though its ad-
vocates divide into two classes respecting the mode of that partici-
pation. It will thus be clearly seen that we have in this section
presented but two theories respecting the law of the Adamic origin
of depravity. Their doctrinal distinction is easily stated, though
for greater clearness we should keep entirely separate all questions
respecting the intrinsic evil of depravity, or whether in itself it is
truly sinful and. deserving of the divine wrath. Both theories hold,
and equally, the Adamic origin of depravity. Both hold its con-
nection with the sin of Adam through which he fell under the
divine retribution and suffered the corruption of his own nature. So
far the two theories are the same. Beyond this they differ widely.
The one denies a responsible participation in the sin of Adam and
the penal infliction of depravity on the race; the other affirms both.
These are fundamental theories, and must be separately treated
-w^ ^.,v„, — the Calvinistic in its two modes of accouutinff for the
TWO FUNDA- ...
MENTAL TiiKo- common Adamic sin which it alleges. They are the only
**"''^' fundamental theories. There is no place for a third,
however many speculative or mixed theories may be devised. AYhich-
ever is the true one must contain the whole truth of the question.
III. Speculative or Mixed Theories.
The Calvinistic anthropology involves serious perplexities, partic-
ularly in the tenets of a common participation in the sin of Adam
and the penal infliction of depravity on that ground. The intrinsic
sinfulness of depravity itself, as deserving in all an eternal penal
retribution, deepens these perplexities. The division into the two
modes of accounting for the common j)articipation in the sin of
Adam has a sufficient occasion in these perplexities. Some have
thought the facts concerned more manageable or less perplexing on
the realistic mode, while others for a like reason have favored the
representative mode. Neither party pretends to a solution of the
difficulties. In the view of some minds they are too great for the
acceptance of either mode. Hence, with professed adherence to
the Augustinian anthropology, other theories have been devised,
but without any improvement of doctrine, while mostly definite
tenets are replaced with speculations or mere assumptions. No
light is given.
1. Mediate Imputation of Adamic Sin. — It has been' attempted
to replace the theory of immediate with that of mediate impu-
tation. The former goes properly, in a strictly scientific sense ex-
clusively, with the representative mode of the common Adamic sin.
In all forms of the realistic mode every soul is held to be a respon-
ORIGIN OF DEPRAVITY. 469
sible sharer in the sinning of Adam, and the imputation of the sin
is mediated by that responsible participation. In the representa-
tive mode the race has no part in the sinning of Adam which
mediates the imputation of his sin. Without any fault of the race,
and before iis corruption through the sin of Adam, the guilt of
his sin is imputed, and thus immediately, to every soul.
It is not strange that some Calvinistic minds recoil from such a
riew. In such a recoil, Placseus, an eminent Reformed theory of
theologian of Saumur, France, propounded, in the placj^us.
seventeenth century, the theory of mediate imputation. He began
with an ojjen denial of immediate imputation as a violation of jus-
tice. As such imputation in the ver}^ nature of it disclaims all partici-
pation of the race in the sinning of Adam, the immediate imputation
of his sin to his offspring in a measure to constitute every soul as
guilty as himself could not, in the view of Placasus, be other than
an injustice. His doctrine Avas widely assailed. There was more
than individual hostility. The doctrine was soon condemned by
the National Synod of France, and also by the Churches of Switzer-
land in the Formula Consensus Helvetici. Under this severe press-
ure, Placaeus propounded a doctrine of mediate or consequent
imputation in place of the standard immediate or antecedent impu-
tation.' There is a wide difference between the two theories. In
the latter the imputation of sin precedes the common dejiravity and
is the ground of its penal infliction ; while in the former the impu-
tation of sin is subsequent to the common depravity, and on that
ground. With such a widely different theory Placaaus still pro-
fessed adherence to the doctrine of imputation. Some received his
doctrine with favor. Nor has it been without friends even to the
present time. Some have claimed for its support the weighty
authority of Edwards, though others dispute the claim. There is
nothing in his discussion sufficiently definite to determine the
question. Edwards was predominantly a realist on the Adamic
connection of the race, and so far immediate imputation could have
no consistent place in his doctrine.^ Henry Eogers is one of the
later advocates of the doctrine.*
The doctrine of Placaeus as stated by himself is not thoroughly
clear. Nor have his critics brought it into clearness.
. '^ , _ . OBSCrRITIES
There is no obscurity in the denial of immediate impu- of the the-
tation, for that imputation has a well-defined sense in °^^'
the Calvinistic anthropology. The lack of clearness comes with
' De Statu Hominis Lapsi ante Gratiam ; De Imputatione Pnmi Peccati
Adami.
^ Works, pp. 481-495. ^ Genius and Writings of Jonathan Edwards.
470 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
the assertion of mediate in place of immediate imputation. The
latter means the imputation of Adam's sin antecedently to any fault
or corruption of the race. Seemingly, therefore, mediate imputa-
tion, while in the order of thought subsequent to the common
depravity and conditioned on it, should still include the accounting
of the sin .of Adam to the race. Such a view, however, would be
utterly inconsistent with the denial of immediate imputation as a
violation of justice. The inheritance of the common depravity
under a law of propagation could not constitute any ground of
responsibility for the sin of Adam ; and its imputation simply as
mediated by that depravity would as fully violate justice as immedi-
ate imputation. "What remains of the theory of Placceus ? Two
things: the common depravity of the race as a genetic transmission,
not as a punishment ; the sinfulness and demerit of the inherited
depravity. The first fact is the same as our second fundamental
theory in accounting for the depravity of the race. The second
fact is the common Calvinistic doctrine of the sinfulness and de-
merit of native depravity — a question quite apart from all questions
respecting the ground of depravity. It thus appears that the theory
of Placseus differs from the Calvinistic anthropology only in the
denial of the immediate imputation of Adam's sin; which, however,
carries with it the denial that the common depravity is a penal
infliction.^
2. Hypothetic Ground of the Imputation of Sin. — The theory
thus expressed is technically styled Scientia Media Dei. It is this :
Ood in his absolute prescience knew that any and every soul of the
race, if placed in the state of Adam, would sin just as lie did; there-
fore he might justly and did actually imj)ute the sin of Adam to
every soul. This hypothetic sin is the ground on which the com-
mon, sinful depravity is judicially inflicted upon the race. Strange
as the theory is, it has not been without favor. Its acceptance by
any one presupposes two things : an unyielding adherence to the
common guiltiness of Adam's sin, and a sense of intolerable diffi-
culties in both the realistic and representative modes of accounting
CRITICISM OF for such guiltiness. Surely its own difficulties are no
THETHEOR'k. jcss, whllc tlic hypotlictic ground on which the sin of
Adam is held to be imputed is the merest assumption. Who knows
the alleged fact of the divine cognizance, that every soul of the
race, if placed in the state of Adam, would sin just as he did ?
Even if a fact, it could not justify tlie universal, or even the most
' Cunningliam: lieformers and the Thcolorpj of the Refoi-mation, pp. 379-394;
Phecld : Hiatnnj of Doctrines, vol. ii, pp. 158-163 ; Princeton Essays, First Se-
ries, essay viii.
ORIGIN OF DEPRAVITY. 47I
limited, imputation of his sin. Otherwise, we might all be held
responsible for any and every sin which in any condition we might
possibly commit. " But it is a new sort of justice, which would
allow us to be punished for sins which we never committed, or never
intended to commit, but only might possibly have committed under
certain circumstances."' "If it were allowable to refer to some
intermediate knowledge on God's part as a basis of imputing the guilt
and condemnation of original sin to all men, we might with equal
propriety argue that God could justly have introduced mankind at
once into a state of misery or bliss, upon the ground of his fore-
knowledge that certain of them would voluntarily make themselves
liable to the one or the other destiny." °
This theory gives no distinct law of the Adamic origin of de-
pravity. Depravity itself is still a punishment, judi-
^ . : . ^ ^ ' . "^ NO DISTINCT
cially inflicted on the ground of a common participation law of de-
in the sin of Adam. The particij^ation is in the mode p^-^^'ty-
of imputation, with a valueless, or even worse than valueless,
change of its ground. The economy of representation is replaced
with the purely hypothetic assumption respecting the cognizance
of the divine prescience. If this assumption could be true, or
even were true, a more baseless ground of imputation could not be
imagined. It is worse than baseless; it would subvert the most
sacred principles of moral government. So far from any relief
from the perplexities of immediate imj)utation, it brings in far
deeper perplexities,
3. Origin of Sin in a Pre-existent Life. — With the tenets of
native depravity as a judicial infliction, and the sinfulness of de-
pravity in a sense to deserve eternal punishment, the problem is to
account for them. Confessedly, they are not explained to rational
thought in any mode previously considered. In the view of some
minds the only valid ground of guilt and punishment, occasion of
in any strict judicial sense, must lie in a free, personal '^"'^ theory.
violation of duty. The realistic mode of accounting for the penal
infliction of depravity might claim to justify itself on this prin-
ciple, but could hardly pretend to such a claim respecting the
alleged demerit of native depravity, f^ome, iiowever, find no
place for this principle in any form of realism; indeed, reject the
whole theory. If such must still hold the native sinfulness of all men,
there is for them no better resource than the theory of free, personal
sinning in a previous state of existence. They would thus avoid
the perplexities of the immediate imputation of Adam's sin, and
' Knapp : Christian Theology, p. 277.
"^ Miiller : Christian Doctrine of Sin, vol. ii, p. 338.
472 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
tlieoretically secure tlie ouly principle which, in their view, can
justify tlic common native sinfulness.
Some have adopted this view. The notion of a pre-existence of
human souls has been far more extensive than its acceptance in
order to avoid peculiar difficulties of the Augustinian anthropology.
NOTION OF ^^ holds a wide place in heathen religions, and appears
ruK-KxisT- in Grecian philosophy. It found a place in Jewish
^^^^' thought, as clearly implied in the question of our
Lord's disciples : ''Master, who did sin, this man, or his parents,
that he was born blind?"' Origen, of the third century, taught
the doctrine. It is the theory of Edward Beecher's Conflict of Ages,
and is maintained with special reference to the Augustinian anthro-
pology. The eminent Julius Midler maintains it, and for the rea-
son above stated, that only free, personal sinning can justify the
sinful state in which he believed all men to be born. He could
find no place for such sinning except in a conscious pre-existence
of all human souls, and, therefore, accepted this view, that he might
justify his theory of native sinfulness.^
The theory is a purely speculative one. Midler himself so styles
.„„.,,. ^ it, and freely concedes the absence of all direct proof in
spKcuLATiTE botli Scripturc and consciousness.^ In his view, as
TUhORT. appears in his elaborate discussion, the whole proof
lies in its necessity to a vindication of the divine justice in a com-
mon native sinfulness. There is native sinfulness. There can-
not be sinfulness without free, personal violation of duty. Such
action, as an account of native sinfulness, was possible to us only
in a pre-existent state. Therefore we must have personally existed
and freely sinned in such a state. This is the argument.
Native sinfulness, as maintained in the Augustinian authrojDol-
ogy, is not a problem to be solved in this purely speculative mode.
Logical requirements are valid for truth ouly with validity in the
premises. Very few accept both jiremises in this case. Many
deny the native sinfulness in the sense assumed, and many deny
the necessity of free, personal agency to such sinfulness. The for-
mer have no need of the interpretation which the theory offers,
and therefore see no proof in its logical requirements; the
latter would rather face the perplexities of the immediate imputa-
DiKFicuniFs ^^^^^ ^^ ^^^ than accept relief in this purely speculative
OF THK TiiK- mode. Very serious difficulties beset the theory in its
^^^' relation to the Scriptures. It implies, and must admit,
that our progenitors, just as their olfsjjring, freely sinned in the
' John ix, 2. ' Christian Doctrine of Sin, book iv, chap. iv.
■'IbiJ., vol. ii, pp. 36, 396.
ORIGIN OF DEPRAVITY. 473
/pre-existence assumed, and therefore began their Edenic life in
a sinful and fallen state. ^ This is plainly contrary to the Script-
ures, in the sense of which, as we have previously shown, the
beginning of this/life was in innocence and subjective holiness.
Again, as the Edenic state was strictly probationary in its moral
and religious economy, this theory must assume a possible self-
recovery of our progenitors from their fallen state; for such a
probation intrinsically requires the possibility of righteousness in
the fulfillment of its duties." But it is the clear sense of Script-
ure that there is no self -recovery of sinners; indeed, that there is
no recovery of such except through a redemptive economy. Fur-
ther, while this theory holds that each soul is born in an evil state
in consequence of free, personal sinning in a previous existence,
it is the clear sense of Scripture, as previously shown, that this
state of evil is the consequence of the Adamic fall in the Edenic
probation. Finally, in view of the Adamic connection of the race
as set forth in the Scriptures, this theory is constrained to admit a
deeper corruption of our nature in consequence of the Adamic
fall.^ But if, as alleged, such corruption is itself sin, then, with
the deeper corrujjtion, each without any agency of his own has the
deeper sin, and therefore in violation of the fundamental principle
of Justice which the theory asserts. Thus it falls back into the
deepest perplexity of the Augustinian anthroi^ology, from which it
has vainly attempted an escape in the mode of jore-temj^oral sinning.
1 Miiller : Christian Doctrine of Sin, vol. ii, p. 380.
^ Ibid., 1^.382. 'iWd., pp. 386, 387.
474 SYSTEMATIC TnEOLOGY.
CHAPTER IX.
REALISTIC MODE OF ADAMIC SIN.
With a general agreement of Calvinists, that native depravity is
a judicial infliction on the ground of a common participation in
the sin of Adam, there arc, as previously stated, two leading modes
of accounting for that participation: the realistic, and the repre-
sentative. Many authors have appropriated both modes, and seem-
ingly without any notice of their open contrariety. In recent times
some have clearly seen their opposition and reciprocal exclusive-
uess, and more rigidly adhered to the one or the other. We may
linstance Shedd and Hodge, leading representatives respectively of
the two theories.' When these theories previously came into notice
they were merely stated, and their proper review is still on hand.
They are so cardinal in anthropology that such review cannot with
any propriety be omitted. We begin with the realistic theory.
I. Generic Oneness of the Race.
1. A Generic Human Nature. — The theory., in this view of it,
has received no more definite statement than at the hautl of Dr.
Shedd. After citations from Augustine, as containing his own
view, he proceeds: ''These passages, which might be multiplied
indefinitely, are sufficient to indicate Augustine's theory of generic
existence, generic transgression, and generic condemnation. The
substance of this theory was afterward expressed in the scholastic
dictum, ' natura corrumpit personam' — human nature apostatizes —
and the consequences appear in human individuah. In the order
of nature, laaLXxkind exists before the generations of mankind; the
nature is prior to the individuals produced out of it." ^
The doctrine is constructed upon the principle of the scholastic
PRINCIPLE OF realism, according to which genera are objective real-
RKALisM. ities, essential existences in distinction from the indi-
viduals which represent them. There are two forms of the
doctrine respecting the relation of individuals to the generic nature.
In the one view, individuals have no separate being in themselves,
' Shedd : Dogmatic Theology, vol. ii, pp. 15, 16, 38 ; Hodge : Systematic Tlie-
ology, vol. ii, p. 164.
* Histoi'y of Christian Doctrine, vol. ii, pp. 77, 78.
REALISTIC MODE OF ADAMIC SIN. 475
but are mere modes and manifestations of the generic nature. It is
thus one in principle with the pantheism which reduces all things
to mere modes of the one being. In the other view each individual
has the essence of existence in itself, but that essence was previously
in the generic nature, and is derived from it in a process of in-
dividuation whereby individuals receive their separate existence.
Thus in the instance of any species or genus the total being of all
the generations existed in the prior generic nature. The first oak
contained the essence of all its generations; the first pair of lions con-
tained the essential being of ail their progeny down to the present
hour; the first man contained in himself the essence, material and
spiritual, of all human generations. Thus the divine creations
gave instant existence to genera and species, not in their creation of
serial forms, but in the sense of the whole nature out of genera.
which all individuals are produced. It should be specially noted
that the prior existence of individuals in the generic nature is with-
out any individuality even in its most rudimentary form. The
generic nature is in itself a single, simple essence. It follows that
the production of individuals out of such a nature, with separate
and essential existence in themselves, requires in each instance the
abscission or outgoing of so much of its substance as will consti-
tute the separate existence. In the case of man, with a dichotomic
view of his natures, there must be the separation of so much of
the generic essence in the production of each person as will con-
stitute the material and spiritual essence of his being.
This is the doctrine maintained in the higher realism of the Augus-
tinian anthropology. The other form which, as pre-
i^ OJ ... ^ REALISM IN
viously stated, reduces all individuals to mere modes anthropol-
of the one substance, and consequently allows them ^^'^'
only a phenomenal existence, could not be brought into harmony
with this anthropology. Its deepest tenets require the deepest
reality of individual existence in every human person. Each man
as a responsible person must possess in himself the reality of in-
dividual existence. Each man's consciousness absolutely affirms
such an existence. Therefore the theory of a mere phenomenal
existence can have no proper place in Christian anthropology. It
allows no distinctively spiritual nature in man. In assuming a
merely modal or phenomenal existence of individual men, it must
assume a purely unitary substance as the common ground of all
human personalities. This is too senseless for any acceptance in
rational thought. It is the other form of realism, according to
which the generic nature divides itself and distributes a portion to
every individual of the race, that is appropriated in the Angus-
47G SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
tinian anthropology.^ Thus each individual has his own essential
being, separate and distinct from every other. The theory is con-
strained to qualify the generic nature, especially on its jihysical
side. It could not be thouglit that the substance of all human
bodies in its phenomenal and bulk form existed in the body of
Adam. In this exigency the theory seizes upon the most restricted
sense of substance, dismisses all visible qualities of matter, and
holds as remaining only the invisible and metaphysical essence of
its being.
2. Tlie Generic Nature Rational and Voluntary. — The generic
human nature, considered in its purely metaphysical sense, could not
commit the jirimitive sin. By a process of abstraction we may
separate the substance of matter from its properties, but all that
remains exists only in the abstraction of thought. There is no
such matter in reality. If there were, it could fulfill no function
of matter. This is jDossible only with its properties. So, for the
agent in the primitive sin we cannot stoj) with any abstract sense
POSSESSES ^^ mind. There must be the possession of personal
PERSONAL faculties, as necessary to any moral action. Accord-
FAcuLTiEs. iugly, the generic human nature is promj)tly invested
with such faculties. " But this human nature, it must be care-
fully noticed, possesses all the attributes of the human individual;
for the individual is only a portion and specimen of the nature.
Considered as an essence, human nature is an intelligent, rational,
and voluntary essence; and accordingly its agency in Adam par-
takes of the corresponding qualities." *
3. Adam the Generic JVature. — This higher realism often pro-
ceeds in a manner to suggest the existence of the generic human
nature prior to Adam himself. In this view he must be accounted
simply as its first individualized specimen or part in the historic
development of the species. In accordance with this view there is
in the citation given just above a characterization of the agency of
this nature in Adam. The Scriptures, however, so connect the
moral state of the race with the sin of Adam that this realistic
theory cannot dispose of him simph' as an individualized form of
the generic nature, with the only distinction from other individ-
ualized forms that he was the first. The only alternative is to ac-
count Adam the generic human nature, and the race as individual-
ized portions of himself. This is the view taken: " Adam, as the
generic man, was not a mere receptacle containing millions of sep-
arate individuals. The genus is not an aggregation, but a single,
' Shedd : Dogmatic Theolorry, vol. ii, pp. 63-65, 72-74, 78-80.
'^ Shedd : History of ChHstian Doctrine, vol. ii, p. 78.
REALISTIC MODE OF ADAMIC SIN. 477
simple essence. As such, it is not yet cliaracterized by individual-
ity. It, however, becomes varied and manifold by being individ-
ualized ^;^ its jjropagation, or develojjment into a sei'ies. . . . The
individual, as such, is consequently only a subsequent modus exist-
endi ; the first and antecedent mode being the generic humanity,
of which this subsequent serial mode is only another aspect or
manifestation.'"" In a similar view, Baird holds that the creation
of Adam was the creation of the human species.^ Theoretically,
this view most thoroughly identifies the race in a real oneness with
Adam.
4. The Agent in the Primitive Sin. — The theory is obvious and
easily stated at this point. The leading facts are the same, whether
the race is located in Adam or in a generic nature back of him.
There must in either case be the same endowment of personal
qualities. The generic nature, possessing all the necessary facul-
ties of personal agency, was capable of moral action, and in the
use of such powers did most responsibly commit the primitive sin.
It so committed this sin while yet containing in itself, or, rather,
being in itself, the whole substance of the human race. This is
the doctrine maintained.
5. All Men a Part in the Sinning. — A common particijiation in
the primitive sin is maintained on the ground that all men existed /
in Adam when he committed that sin. We have previously seen
the mode of that existence, as maintained in this higher realism.
It was not in a mere germinal or seminal mode, as embodied in a
lower form of realism — a form to be separately considered. A
merely germinal or seminal existence in Adam lacks the identity
with his very being which is necessary to a responsible part in his
sinning. The essential being of the whole race then existed in
Adam, and without any individuality even in the most riTdimentary
sense. Our separate personal existence is by the abscission and
individualization of so much of his very being as constitutes the
essential existence of each one of the race. As so existing in Adam,
we participated in the primitive sin. Indeed, it may as truly be
said that we committed that sin as that Adam himself committed
it. This is the theory.
This doctrine is maintained with much elaboration and asserted
with frequent repetition. A few citations may suffice maintenance
where many are possible. " Adam differed from all of the doc-
other human individuals by containing within his per- '^'^'^^•
son the entire human nature out of which the millions of genera-
tions were to be propagated, and of which they are individual-
' Shedd : Theological Essays, p. 352. ^ The Elohim Revealed, p. 133.
478 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
ized portions. He was to transmit this human nature which was
all in himself, exactly as it had been created in him; for propaga-
tion makes no radical changes, but simply transmits what is given
in the nature, be it good or bad.'" The consequences are then
drawn upon the supposition of obedience or sin in Adam. In the
former case the result would have been the perfect holiness of every
individual of the race. In the actual case of sin there necessarily
follows the sinfulness of every man as an individualized portion of
the generic nature which sinned in Adam. *' The individuals pro-
duced out of it must be characterized by a sinful state and condi-
tion."
" The aim of the "Westminster symbol accordingly, and, it may
CLEAR STATE- ^c addcd, of all the creeds on the Augustinian side of
MEXT. the controversy, was to combine two elements, each
having truth in it — to teach the fall of the human race as a unity,
and, at the same time, recognize the existence, freedom, and guilt
of the individual in the fall. Accordingly, they locate the indi-
vidual in Adam, and make him, in some mysterious but real man-
ner, a responsible partaker in Adam's sin — a guilty sharer, and, in
some solid sense of the word, co-agent in a common apostasy.'"
Whether the more prevalent Calvinistic view accords with this pas-
sage is a question in which Calvinists themselves are far more con-
cerned than others. It forcibly expresses the realistic ground of a
common participation in the sin of Adam. " The total guilt of
the first sin, thus committed by the entire race in Adam, is im-
puted to each individual of the race, because of the indivisibility
of guilt. . . . For though the one common nature that committed
the ' one offense ' is divisible by propagation, the offense itself is
not divisible, nor is the guilt of it. Consequently, one man is as
guilty as another of the whole first sin — of the original act of fall-
ing from God. The individual Adam and Eve were no more guilty
of this first act, and of the whole of it, than their descendants are;
and their descendants are as guilty as they." ' We have sufficiently
stated the realistic ground of a common participation in the sin of
Adam. We have seen in the last citation the measure of the com-
mon guilt. Each individual of the race is held to be as guilty as
Adam himself. This is one of the leading modes in which the
Augustinian anthropology maintains the consistency of a common
native sinfulness with the divine justice and goodness.
' Shedd : History of Christian Doctrine, vol. ii, p. 118.
' Shedd : Theological Essays, pp. 253, 253.
' Shedd : Dogmatic Theology, vol. ii, pp. 185, 186.
REALISTIC MODE OF ADAMIC SIN. 479
II. OBJECTIOlSrS TO THE ThEOKT.
1. Groundless Assumption of a Generic Nature. — Realism itself
is a mere assumption, and, as a philosophj^, has long been replaced
with conceptualism. General terms express general notions or con-
ceptions, but not objective realities. There is no vegetable nature
apart from its individual forms of existence, no animal nature apart
from individuals. There is no existent human nature apart from
individual men. In the organic realm all actual existence is in in-
dividual forms. Nominalism is right in such limitation of actual
existence, though wrong in the denial of general notions as realities
of mental conception. Eealism is right in the admission of general
notions, but wrong in the assertion of objective existences in accord
with these notions. There are no such existences. Hence, there
is no generic human nature.
Realism, however, exists in different forms, and is variously ap-
propriated in doctrinal anthropology.' This being the differencks
case, fairness requires that in any criticism respect '^' kealism.
should be had to the particular form in which it is maintained. In
the present instance the form has been definitely given. The crea-
tion of Adam was the creation of the whole human species, not in
its individualities, but in its substantive existence. Adam con-
tained in himself this whole substance. In the mode of propaga-
tion it is distributed in a manner to constitute the essential exist-
ence of each individual. The theory applies to both the physical
and mental natures of man. The two are spoken of as a complex,
but certainly not with the intention of sinking their distinction or
reducing them to unity. Their distinction is fully recognized.
Did the substance of all human bodies exist in that of Adam?
Certainly not in the form and bulk of flesh and blood. bodily sub-
This is not maintained. In place of such a nature stance.
there is posited a form of matter without bodily projoerties, un-
phenomenal and metaphysical in its mode. The existence of such
a form of matter in Adam is a mere assumption. It certainly does
not appear in the account of his creation.^ His body was formed
from the dust of the ground; and there is no suggestion of any
other form of matter than science now recognizes in the constitu-
tion of the human body. In such a oneness of all human bodies
with that of Adam, a portion of his body must exist in every one as
its proper substance. Otherwise there is no realistic oneness with
him. Any element of the body not originally of the subst:aice of
Adam is utterly useless in such a realism. In no reference of
' Ueberweg : History of Philosophy, vol. i, pp. 358-402. ' Gen. ii, 7.
ISO SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
Scripture to the constitution of the human body is there any inti-
mation of such a specific substance. Neither physics, nor chem-
istry, nor physiology knows any thing of it. Its existence in Adam
and its individuaUzations into innumerable parts, so as to constitute
the substantive reality of all human bodies, are pure assumptions.
The theory of a generic spiritual nature created in Adam, which
MENTAL sDB- scrvcd as a personal mind in himself, and by successive
STANCE. abscissions furnishes the essence of every personal mind,
i-? equally groundless. No direct proof is offered. Little indirect
proof is even attempted. It may attempt a defense of itself by
charging other theories of .the origin of individual souls with equal
mystery and perplexity: as, for instance, the theory of their creation
in Adam and propagation from him; or, that of their immediate
and successive creations along with the propagations of the race.
If all that is thus alleged is true, not an atom of proof is thus
gained for this form of realism. After all that may be said either
in its support or defense, it must remain a groundless speculation.
2. Imjyossihle Individuation info the Many. — Such realism in
theological anthropology requires the generic human nature to be
invested with personal faculties. It must have originally existed
in personality, for else it could not have committed the primitive
sin. We have previously seen the full recognition of these facts,
and the prompt and unreserved investment of the generic nature
PERSONALITY "wlth persoual faculties. Its individuation into the
INDIVISIBLE, many, into the innumerable personalities of the race,
is thus rendered impossible. As personally endowed and capable of
free and responsible moral agency, the generic nature, on its mental
side, must have existed in simple unity of spiritual essence and
personality. Neither is divisible or distributable into the many.
It will hardly be pretended that personality can be so treated,
though it is claimed that the spiritual essence may be. IIow can
the essence be divided without dividing or destroying the person-
ality? Personality arises with the complex of personal faculties. The
faculties are intrinsic to the spiritual essence. All distinction of
essence and faculty is purely in thought. No loose connection can
be allowed, which might meet the exigency of this form of real-
ism. The whole mental essence is present in every mental faculty
und active in every mental action. How then can the essence be
divided without dividing or destroying the personality? This very
::;3riou8 difficulty presses the theory not only in respect to generic
Adam, but equally in every instance of subdivision of essence in all
Tie individual propagations of the race.
'I'here is no escape from such difficulty through an assumption
REALISTIC MODE OF ADAMIC SIN. 481
that only a small portion of the generic spiritual essence, just
enough for the constitution of a single person, belonged mind indi-
to the personality of Adam and was active in his agency. tiscble.
Such an assumption would be openly contradictory to the deepest
principles of the theory. It maintains the universal native sinful-
ness, in the double sense of corruption and guilt, on the ground
that the whole generic spiritual essence was present and active in
the sinning of Adam. Honce, as all human souls are individuaL
ized portions of that generic soul, they had a responsible part in
the Adamic sin, are actually guilty of that sin, and justly punishr
able on that ground. These are the vital facts of the theory; and
with no one of these can it part without self-destruction. It re-
mains true that the generic sjiiritual essence in Adam, as held in
this theory,' existed and acted in the purest form of personality.
Hence the theory cannot void the insuperable difficulties which be-
set the notion of its division and distribution into the innumer-
able personalities of the race. A statue in metal might be fused
and recast into many, but only with the destruction of the original
and a diminution of size according to the number of the new; but
a spiritual essence existing in the mode of personality cannot be
the subject of such treatment.'
3. Equally Sharers in all Ancestral Deeds. — Weput this objection
in the broadest application, and maintain that, if on the ground of
a real oneness with Adam we are responsible sharers in the primi-
tive sin, we must equally share all the sins, and all the good deeds
as well, of all our intermediate ancestors.
A like objection, but of narrow application, is put thus: If on
the ground of a real oneness with Adam and Eve we a narrower
are responsible sharars in their first sin, so must we '*'"^^-
share all their subsequent sins. The objection is logically perti-
nent only with respect to such sins as were committed before the
division of the generic nature through propagation and the forma-
tion of separate parental headships. After such disconnection
there could be no responsible sharing in their sins. The objection,
however, is thoroughly valid respecting sins previously committed.
A refutation of the objection so brought is attempted in this man-
ner: '' The reply is that the sinful acts of Adam and Eve after
the fall differed from the act of eating the forbidden fruit in two
respects: 1. They were transgressions of the moral law, not of the
probationary statute. 2. They were not committed by the entire
race in and with Adam."' ''
' Per contra, Shedd : Dogmatic Theology, vol. ii, pp. 83-87.
nUd., p. 88.
482 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
The answer in the second point is utterly void within the liraita-
TriE ANswKR tion of the objection as above stated. On the truth of
'^o'"- the theory, the whole race must have existed in Adam
and shared in all his acts, prior to the division of the generic nat-
ure by propagation, just as completely as in the primitive sin. The
answer in the first point is equally void. There is no difference
between a moral law and a probationary statute, or between the
transgression of the one and the other, which can in the least affect
the ground of a common responsibility, as it is maintained in this
theory. It is not that the Edenic law was positive in kind and
probationary in economy, that all men are held to bo responsible
sharers with Adam in its transgression, but because all then ex-
isted in the very essence of his being, and therefore must share in
his sin. Hence, as the same form of existence in Adam continued
until a division of the generic nature through propagation, all men
must have shared in every previous sin of Adam just as deeply as
in his first sin. The theory of representation might insist upon
the probationary office of the Edenic law as affecting the question
of our responsibility for any other sins of Adam; but for the real-
istic theory, such insistence is the surrender of its deepest princi-
ple. A further reply utterly fails. To the objection that as the
whole human nature remained iii Adam and Eve until a division in
the propagation of Cain, therefore all their previous sins as really as
the first must be charged to their posterity, " the reply is that the
imputation, even in this case, would not lie upon any individual
persons of the posterity, for there are none, but only upon the
non-individualized nature. These personal transgressions of Adam,
if charged at all, could be charged only upon the species." ' True:
there were no individual persons of the posterity in that interval
of time; and no more were there any at the time of the first sin;
and in both cases the relation between Adam and his posterity was
precisely the same; and the first sin, just as the later sins, must be
charged to the generic nature, because as yet no individualized
persons existed.
We have put the same objection more broadly: that, on the truth
THE BROADER of tlus reallstic theory and the reality of a responsible
OBJECTION. part of each in the primitive sin, we are all responsible
sharers in all the deeds of our ancestors in the long line of descent
from Adam, This position is maintained on the ground that, ac-
cording to this realistic theory, we existed in each ancestor in this long
line of descent in precisely the same manner in which we existed
in Adam. If that manner of existence made us sharers in his sin,
' Shedd : Dogmatic Thcolorjy, vol. ii, p. 90.
REALISTIC MODE OF ADAMIC SIN. 483
it must equally make us sharers in the sins, and in the good deeds
as well, of all our ancestors. In the division of the generic nature
through propagation, in each instance there was communicated,
not only enough for the new personality, but enough more for an
indefinite number of further individualizations into per.:;onalities.
This law must rule the whole process of propagation. The theory
requires it, and without it would become a nullity. " The specific
nature was a deposited invisible substance in the first human pair.
... As thus deposited by creation in Adam and Eve, it was to be
transmitted. In like manner, every individual man along with his
individuality receives, not, as Adam did, the whole of human nat-
ure, but a fraction of it, to transmit and individualize." ' Thus in
the long line of human parentage each one receives from Adam,
through his own ancestry, a non-individualized portion of the gen-
eric human nature, which he transmits through propagation.
Every one possesses the portion transmitted to him in the same
manner in which Adam possessed the whole. This is the theory.
If it is true, it follows that every man is a sharer in all the moral
deeds of his ancestry in the long line of descent from Adam.
No answer voids this consequence. The attempts sigrally fail.
" All individuals excepting the first two include each futile an-
but a fractional part of human nature. A sin com- ^^'^'^•
mitted by a fraction is not a sin committed by the whole unity.
Individual transgression is not the original transgression, or Adam's
first sin."^ In truth, the original unity of the generic nature was
severed in the creation of Eve, so that no one sin, not even the first,
was committed by that whole nature. Hence this theory must ad-
mit that the presence of the whole generic nature in any one sin is
not necessary to a responsible sharing therein on the part of the
sinner's offspring. Therefore this answer to our objection, which
proceeds upon the assumption of a determining distinction between
the whole generic nature and only a part of it as it respects the
consequence of sin to the offspring of the sinner, is utterly ground-
less. Further answer must be attempted. That portion of the
generic nature which each person receives with his own propaga-
tion, " and which he transmits, does not act with him and sin
with him in his individual transgressions. It is a latent nature
or principle which remains in a quiescent state, in reference to his
individuality. It is inactive, as existing in him."' All this is
easily said; but what is the warrant for saying it? No reason is
given for the alleged inactivity of that portion of the generic nat-
ure which each one receives for further individualization and trans-
' Shedd : Dogmatic Theologtj, vol. ii, p. 90. ^ Ibid., -p. 91. ^ Ibid., p. 93.
4St SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
mission. We have previously seen that just as the whole was orig-
inally deposited in Adam, so a part is deposited in each individual;
and, also, that the individual possesses the part in the same man-
ner and for the same purpose of transmission that Adam possessed
the whole. As the whole existed in Adam in a simple unity of
spiritual essence, so the portion exists in each individual in the
same unity. If the whole was active in the agency of Adam so as
to constitute all men sharers in his sin, the whole part must be
active in the agency of the individual and constitute his progeny,
even to the latest generation, sharers in his moral deeds.
The results are singular and startling; in some facts, appalling.
SINGULAR AH the descendants of Abraham in the line of Isaac
RESULTS. shared in the faith which was accounted to him for
righteousness; ' and were as really as Isaac offered up by faith.'
Solomon shared in his own father's adultery, and equally in his pro-
found repentance. These instances are given simply as illustra-
tions of the principle. The principle rules every individual life.
What any one is through his own deeds in the present life is as
nothing compared with what he is through a responsible participa-
tion in the deeds of his ancestors. The number of such deeds
is beyond conception. And what a mixture of the good and the
bad, the noble and the vile ! deeds of every quality, and running
through every grade of every quality! And how often must every
one have been lost in sharing the sins of some ancestors, and
saved in sharing the repentance and faith of others! As this theory
is usually maintained, the appalling implication is that every one
begins the present life with the accumulation upon his soul of all
the sins of all his ancestors in the ' long line of his descent from
Adam. There must be error in such a theory.
4. No Responsible Part in the Primitive Sin. — The ground on
which this theory maintains a responsible sharing of all men in the
primitive sin should be restated in connection with the present
point. '' The first sin of Adam, being a common, not an individ-
ual sin, is deservedly and justly imputed to the posterity of Adam
upon the same principles upon which all sin is deservedly and
justly imputed; namely, that it was committed by those to whom
it is imputed."' The statement proceeds with the assumption of
free agency, "the free agency of all mankind in Adam," as the
ground of their responsible sharing in his sin. "This agency,
though differing in the manner, is yet as real as the subsequent
free agency of each individual." The whole generic human nature
'Rom. iv, 3 ; Gal. iii, 6. 'Heb. xi, 17.
' Shedd : Dogmatic Theology, vol. ii, p, 186.
REALISTIC MODE OF ADAMIC SIN. 485
existed in Adam, and was present and active in the commission of
his sin.
This generic nature, simply as such, could not sin. Adam could
sin only in his own personal agency, and the whole guilt ^ nature
of his sin was his own personal guilt. If it should be cannot sin.
said that he was so much the greater in himself, and his guilt so
much the greater, because of the presence of the whole generic
nature in him, and if all this were true, it could not change the
facts as above stated. It is still true, that a nature, simply in itself
or without personalization, can exercise no personal agency; still
true that the whole agency in the primitive sin was the personal
agency of Adam himself, and the whole guilt his own. Hence,
when it is said, as it often is, and as the theory requires, that the
whole generic nature was present and active in Adam, the meaning
must be, if there is any meaning, to the purpose, that that whole
nature was personalized in him — just as any individualized portion
which constitutes the spiritual essence of an individual man must
be personalized in him. The theory must accept this view, or else
surrender all ground of pretension even, that the whole generic
nature was responsibly active in the sinning of Adam. The result
gives us a wonderful Adam; an Adam who possessed in his own
personality all the spiritual essence out of which, by a ceaseless
process of abscission, are produced all individual minds of the race,
even to the last man. He should have been far greater than he
was; greater even than the infinitely exaggerated Adam of an ear-
lier theology. He appears in no such greatness.
A very serious difficulty again emerges. The theory must answer
for the individualization of this Adam into the innu- a further
merable personalities of the race. He exists and acts in difficulty.
a simple unity of personality, just as any other individual man.
The presence of the whole generic nature in him does not change
this fact. To say that it does is to sunder that nature from his
personality, and consequently to deny it all and any j^art in the
Adamic sin. The most fundamental principle of the theory would
thus be surrendered. The theory must answer for the requisite
individualizations of such, an Adam. The task is an impossible
one. The division and distribution of a spiritual essence, consid-
ered simply as an essence, into the innumerable personalities of
the race transcends the utmost reach of human philosophy. The
notion of such a division and distribution of such an essence, already
existing in personality and active in personal agency, is vitterly
aberrant from all rational thinking upon such a question.
The existence of the generic nature in Adam is held for the sake
486 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
of its distribution into all human persons, that they may be ac-
No GROUND OF couutcd respousible sharers in his sin. The difficulties
THK ouiLT. of i]^Q distribution disprove it, and consequently disprove
the whole theory. This is not the whole case against the theory.
Neither the existence of the generic nature in Adam, nor its divis-
ion and personalization in all men, nor both together could make
them guilty sharers in his sin. The reason is that on neither sup-
position, nor on both together, was there in them the personal
agency necessary to such participation. Nor do we here attempt
to force upon the theory any principle not its own. It affirms the
participation of all men in the guilt of Adam's sin, on the ground
that all participated in its commission, and by the exercise of a
personal agency just as real and free as any which they possess and
exercise in their individual existence. In previous citations we
have given repeated declarations of this principle. One appears
under the present head. It is thus admitted that free personal
agency is necessary to the commission of sin, and that all men can
share the guilt of the first sin only on the ground of sharing its
commission. This is an accepted principle of this higher realism.
There was no such participation of all men in the primitive sin.
The alleged ground of it is utterly inadequate. The determining
facts of the question clearly show this.
" For the individuals Adam and Eve were self-conscious. So
A FRUITLESS far as they were concerned, the first sin was a very de-
REPLY. liberate and intensely willful act. The human species
existing in them at that time acted in their act, and sinned in their
sin, similarly as the hand or eye acts and sins in the murderous
or lustful act of the individual soul. The hand or the eye has no
separate self-consciousness of its own, parallel with the soul's self-
consciousness. Taken by itself, it has no consciousness at all.
But its union and oneness with the self-conscious soul, in the personal
union of soul and body, affords all the self -consciousness that is pos-
sible in the case. The hand is co-agent with the soul, and hence is
particeps criminis, and has a common guilt with the soul. In like
manner the psychico-ph3^sical human nature existing in Adam
and Eve had no separate self-consciousness parallel with that of
Adam and Eve. Unlike the visible hand or eye, it was an invisible
substance or nature capable of being transformed into myriads of
self-conscious individuals; but while in Adam, and not yet distrib-
uted and individualized, it had no distinct self -consciousness of its
own, any more than the hand or eye in the supposed case. But
existing and acting in and with these self-conscious individuals, it
participated in their self-determination, and is chargeable with
IlEALISTIC MUDE OF ADAMIC SIN. 487
their sin, as the hand, and eye, and whole body is chargeable
with the sin of the individual man. As in the instance of the
individual unity, every thing that constitutes it, body as well as
soul, is active and responsible for all that is done by this unity, so
in the instance of the specific unity, every thing that constitutes
it, namely, Adam and the human nature in him, is active and re-
sponsible for all that is done by this unity." ' We have given this
passage at such length that the determining facts of the question
might stand in the clearest light.
The illustrations of the realistic position are first in place for
criticism. Neither the hand nor the eye is a guilty vain illus-
sharer in any sin because a bodily member of the per- trations.
son sinning. Neither is capable of guilt or of any moral act. The
hand, for instance: what part has it in the murderous deed sup-
posed? The murder is wholly the deed of the personal agent, and
his hand is as purely instrumental to his agency as the knife with
which he makes the deadly thrust. Let the hand be amputated
and cast away: could it still be guilty? As well count the dagger
guilty. Yet, on the principles and requirements of this theory, it
ought still to be guilty. The fallacy begins with the assumption
of a union and oneness of the hand with the self-conscious soul.
There is no such union and oneness of the two. Nor can the hand
be a co-agent with tlie soul, and for the reason that it is capable
of no such agency. Nor can it be uparticeps crimiriis in any sin
of the soul. A particeps criminis is an actual sinner, and must
have in himself the power of sinning. The same facts must be
true of the hand if in any instance it is a p)articep8 criminis.
They cannot be true of the hand. The illustration betrays the
weakness of the realistic position.
We may readily agree that, if the generic nature — that out of
which all individual souls are produced — existed in
^ DISTINCTION
Adam and Eve at the time of the first sin, it "is or naturk
chargeable with their sin, as the hand, and eye, and '^^^ person.
whole body is chargeable with the sin of the individual man," for
that is not to be chargeable at all. Whatever the theory may assert
respecting the presence of the generic nature with the personal
Adam, it must ever distinguish the two and hold the separability
of the latter from the former. As so separated, it is simply a
nature, without personality until distributed and personalized in
individual men. It is a fundamental part of this theory that every
man, even from the first moment of his individual existence, is sin-
ful. But the individualization of the generic nature into new per-
' Shedd : Dogmatic Theologtj, vol. ii, pp. 191, 193.
488 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
eonalities does not change its chtiructer. This is explicitly affirmed.
Hence, if guilty as soon as individualized, the nature itself, and
simply as such, must have been constituted guilty by the sin of
Adam. But guilt is a purely personal fact, and has no ground in a
mere nature. The guilt of Adam's sin was purely personal to
himself, and could no more become the guilt of a generic nat-
ure in him than the hand of a murderer could share the guili
of his crime. The theory is that the sin of Adam constituted
the whole generic nature guilty, and, further, that, on the divi-
sion of this nature into the innumerable individuals of the race,
every one is as guilty of that sin as Adam himself. Such facts
utterly disprove the theory.
III. A Lower Form of Realism.
There is a lower form of realism on which a common participa-
tion in the sin of Adam is maintained. While differing in some
respects from the higher realism, it is yet so similar in its leading
principles and facts that a much briefer discussion will suffice.
1. Definitive Statement of the Theonj. — It is grounded on the
/ principle of a germinal or seminal existence of the race in Adam.
Whether such form of existence included both body and soul is
often left without any definite statement. This is specially the
case respecting the latter. It may safely be said that the body is
always included, but whether the soul is included is often left an
open question. In the distinction of theories this theory is pop-
/ ularly called traducian; but it cannot be so called in precisely the
same sense as the higher realism. The reason is that it holds a
very different mode of existence in Adam. In the higher realism
this existence, as we have previously shown, is in the mode of a uni-
tary generic nature, without any individualization even in the most
germinal or rudimentary form; so that the propagation of the race
is by a ceaseless abscission of portions of that nature. In the lower,
the existence of tlie race in Adam is with such individualizations
as always characterize seminal or germinal entities, and the propa-
gation is through their communication and development. Some
hold the immediate creation of the soul on occasion of the propa-
gation of the body. In such case the theory is traducian only with
respect to the body, and creational with respect to the soul.
The notion of a germinal existence of the race in Adam as the
A FAMILIAR grouud of a common particii)ation in his sin very often
viKw. appears in the literature of the Augustinian anthropol-
\. ogy. The conception finds its most frequent illustration in the
relation subsisting between the root and the branches of a tree.
REALISTIC MODE OF ADAMIC SIN. 489
and between the head and members of the body. One instance
may suffice. " We say that Adam, being the root and head of all
human kind, and we all branches from that root, all parts of that
body whereof he was the head, Ms tvill may be said to be ours. We
ivere then all that one man — we were all in him, and had no other
will but liis; so that though that be extrinsic unto us, considered
as particular persons, yet it is intrinsical, as we are all parts of
one common nature. As in him we sinned, so in him we had a will
of sinning."' This citation is, at once, a clear statement of the
theory and a justification of our own statement.
2. Doctrinal Aim of the Theory. — The aim is the same as in the
higher form of realism ; namely, so to identify the offspring of
Adam in a real oneness with himself in the primitive transgression
that they may be justly chargeable with a guilty participation in
that sin. This is so clearly the case that no further explication is
required.
3. The Theory Inadequate to the Aim. — The offspring of Adam
cannot in this mode be identified with him in a responsible one-
ness. A careful inspection of the illustrations readily discovers the
inadequacy of the ground for any such identification.
Here is, first, the relation of all men to Adam in the primitive
sin as illustrated by the relation of the body and its head and
members to the head. In this illustration the head ^o^'^.
represents the personality. The members of the body are subject
to the head, but only as instruments of its agency. If the head
sins, no member shares the sinning. No one either chooses the
evil or executes the choice. The attemj^t to distribute the respon-
sibility to the members of the body severally, after locating it en-
tirely in the head, is a fruitless endeavor. The primitive sin was
an act of free personal agency, and could not else have been a sin.
That agency was wholly in Adam. We had no such existence in
him as made us sharers in his personal act or in the guilt of his sin.
Indeed, we had less identity with him than exists between the
members of the body and the head. In this case there is an organic
union and a resulting bodily unity. There is no answering identity
of mankind with Adam through the mode of their primordial exist-
ence in him. Even their bodies were not organically one with his
body, just as the acorns which an oak bears were not organically
one with itself. Much less could we have been so one with him in
personality as to share in his personal agency and in the guilt of
his sin.
Equally useless is the figure of the tree for the purpose of show-
' Owen : Works (Goold's), vol. x, p. 73.
490 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
ing a responsible oneness of the race with Adam in the primitive
ROOT AND sin. The root is representatively the personal agent.
TRKE. The branches which exist germinally in the root, and
because of such an existence, must be so identified with it as to
be responsible sharers in its sinful agency. In like manner all
men, as branches from the Adamic root, must be so identified
with the personal Adam as to be responsible sharers in the prim-
itive sin. No ground is disclosed for such participation. The
branches might suffer from the sin of the root, but could not share
its sin and guilt. The first sin was from the personal agency of
Adam. That agency was his own, and could not be shared by all
men through the mode of a mere germinal existence in him. Dis-
tinct personal agency conditions sinful action. Indeed, this is con-
ceded in all attempts to identify the race in a real and responsible
oneness with Adam. In this all attempts fail. This lower realism
signally fails. The assumed germinal entities, if really existent in
Adam and subsequently developed into the personalities of the
race, had no personal existence in him. Therefore they could not
share either the act or the guilt of his sin.
The passage above cited from Owen is constructed as an argu-
FL-RTHKR mcut for the theory which is maintained; but close in-
cRiTicisMs. spcction discovers in it serious logical deficiencies, the
pointing out of which will further show the groundlessness of the
theory. The argument starts with the assumption of a rudimentary
existence of all men in Adam, and respecting the soul as well as
the body. Whether the soul so existed in Adam is still an open
question with theologians. Augustine himself was always in serious
doubt of it. Calvin rejected it, and the Eeformed theologians
mostly agreed with him. It has no place in any church creed.*
' There are three theories respecting the origin of the soul :
1. The theory of pre-existence. This theory holds the existence of souls
in a conscious and responsible mode anterior to their birth into the present
life. It has no necessary distinction from other theories respecting the origin
of the soul in a divine creation, but differs from them in placing that creation
anterior to the present life. This is all that is peculiar to the theory respect-
ing the origin of the soul.
2. Creationism. This theory holds the creation of souls along with the proc-
ess of propagation. The body is propagated, but the soul is an immediate
creation, either at the inception of the body or during its gi'owth.
3. Traducianism, This theory holds the creation of all souls in Adam, and,
consequently, the propagation of the soul with the body.
Theologians divide on these theories — mainly on the last two. Nor is there
any unanimity of view in any great school of theology. Some Augustinians
are creationists ; others, traducianists. The same is true of Arminians.
REALISTIC MODE OF ADAMIC SIN. 491
When so doubtful a j^rinciple takes the vital place of a logical prem-
ise the whole argument must be weak. On the ground of such
an assumed existence in Adam the argument proceeds: "his will
may he said to he ours." May be said! Many things may be said
without proper warrant for the saying. With a doubtful premise
and a merely hypothetic inference as the best support that can be
given to the theory, its weakness is manifest. There is no ground
for even this hypothetic inference. Such an actual existence in
Adam could in no sense and requirement of the theory make his
will our own. We had no part in his sin which this hypothetic
possession of his will is intended to express. Hence the theory, as
set forth in this argumentative statement, utterly fails to furnish any
adequate ground for a common participation in the sin of Adam.
No stronger statement can be made with any logical warrant.
IV. Objections to the Lower Eealism.
In addition to the objections presented in the discussion of this
theory, a few special objections should be stated.
1. Implication of Seminal Guilt. — The theory clearly has this
implication. The common guilt is charged to the account of a
seminal existence in Adam when he committed the first sin, and
solely on that ground. The development of the seminal entities
then in him into a personal mode of existence is in no sense the
ground or condition of the guilt. This is the theory. It follows
that we must have been guilty in our seminal state. The mode of
existence on which the guilt is grounded was then complete. If
not guilty then, we could not be guilty now. The result utterly
discredits the theory. There is no subject of guilt below personal-
ity; and the notion that all human souls, existing in Adam in a
mere rudimentary mode, could in that state be guilty of his sin,
and the subject of the divine wrath, is too preposterous for the ut-
most credulity.
2. Guilty of All Ancestral Sins. — This objection is the same in
principle as one urged against the higher realism. It is as thor-
oughly valid in this case as in that, and equally weighs against the
lower realism. In the inevitable logic of facts the theory has this
consequence. It cannot be voided by declaring Adam a public
person, while the relation of every subsequent father is merely in-
dividual. Such a declaration replaces the realistic ground of guilt
with the representative — an entirely different ground, as we have
previously pointed out. The surrender of a theory is a very poor
way of defending it. ISTor is there any escape through such a pro-
genitorship of Adam that all souls existed in him, while only a
492 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
part existed in any later parentage. It is not the totality of exist-
ence in Adam that is the ground of the alleged guilt, but the fact
and mode of that existence. The mode is precisely the same in all
subsequent parentages as in Adam himself. Benjamin existed in
Jacob, and Jacob in Isaac in the very mode in which each existed
in Adam. If the principle is valid in the one case, so is it in all
others. If guilty of Adam's sin because then seminally in him, we
must be guilty of all the sins of our ancestors committed while sem-
inally in them. Augustine saw this consequence, and admitted its
probable reality, though with hesitation.' Well might he hesitate
to accept the result of such an accumulation of sin upon every
human soul. The theory which inevitably involves such a conse-
quence must be false.
3. Repentance and Forgiveness of the Race in Adam. — If Adam
repented, as generally agreed, he was graciously forgiven. Then,
if so really one with him as to be sharers in his sin, on the same
ground we should equally share his repentance. If we still existed
in him in the same manner as when he sinned, no reason can be
given Avhy we should not Just as fully share his repentance as
his sin. It follows that, on such a repentance, our own in the
same moral sense in which it was his, we should have been
graciously forgiven with him. Why then should native deprav-
ity be inflicted as a punishment on the ground of a common
particijsation in the guilt of Adam's sin, when the whole ground of
its infliction was removed before the propagation of the race? No
reason can be given for such infliction; which, however, the theory
fully holds. Indeed, all the reason of the case is against it. It is
plain, in the view of such facts, that the implications of the theory
cannot be adjusted to its principles. Hence these implications wit-
ness against its truth.
The theory of a realistic oneness of the race with Adam in no
form of it offers sufficient ground for a common participation in
his sin, or for the judicial infliction of native depravity upon the
race.
' Wiggers: Augustinism and Pelagianism, pp. 384, 285.
REPRESENTATIVE MODE OF ADAMIC GUILT. 493
CHAPTEE X.
REPBESEIfTATIVE MODE OF ADAMIC atHLT.
This is the second leading mode in which a common participa-
tion in the sin of Adam is maintained as the ground of a Judicial
infliction of dej)ravity upon the race. It is so cardinal in itself,
and so different from the realistic theory, as to require separate
treatment. It may be observed that in the present formula we
place the word guilt where in the previous one we placed the word
sin. There is in the difference of the two theories a reason for this
change. In the realistic theory all men are held to have partici-
pated in the commission of the primitive sin, so that it is their own
as really as it was Adam's; while in the representative there was no
actual participation in that sin, but only a sharing in its guilt.
Tliis distinction will more fully appear in the discussion of the
present question.
I. Legal Oxeness of the Race.
1. Federal Headsliip of Adam. — The theory is that God insti-
tuted a covenant with Adam whereby he was constituted federal
head and representative of the race in the primitive probation.
This federal headship constituted a moral or legal oneness of the
race with Adam; so that the legal consequence of his conduct under
the law of probation, and whether good or bad, might justly be
reckoned to them. His obedience should thus be accounted to
them as their obedience, or his transgression as their transgression. .
In this sense the probation and fall of Adam were the probation
and fall of the race. Hence the guilt of his sin could be justly
accounted to them.'
3. Immediate Imputation of His Sin, — After the representative
lieadship of Adam, there is still the question of the manner in which
all men share his sin. It is not theirs intrinsically or immedi-
ately, as from an actual sharing in the sin, but becomes theirs by a
judicial act of divine imputation. This imputation, however, car-
ries over to them neither the act nor the demerit of Adam's sin,
' Witsius; The Covenants, vol. i, chap, ii ; Wallace : Representative Respon-
sibility, discourse i ; Cunningham : Theology of the Reformation, essay vii, sec.
it ; Hodge : Systematic Theology, vol. ii, pp. 131, 197.
494 SVSrE.MATIC THEOLOGY.
' but only its guilt as an amenability to punishment. It is proper
to justify this statement from Calvinistic autliorities. In this man-
ner the doctrine will receive fuller explication.
In the earlier Calvinian anthropology, largely realistic and often
iumblinc: the two modes of Adaraic guilt, the immedi-
SKNSE OK IM- •' ® . , I r^ •.ill
MKDiATK IM- atc imputation of the first sin to the human race was
pl-tat:on. greatly lacking in clearness of treatment. In later
times, and with a more thorough distinction of the two modes of
guilt, this imputation has received very exact statement at the
hand of masters in the representative school. " Adam was consti-
tuted by God the representative and federal head of his posterity, so
that his trial or probation was virtually and in God's estimation
. . . the trial or probation of the human race; and that thus the
transgression of Adam became, in a legal and judicial sense, and
without any injustice to them, theirs, so that they were justly in-
volved in its proper consequences.^'' "In virtue of the union,
federal and natural, between Adam and his posterity, his sin, al-
though not their act, is so imputed to them that it is the judicial
ground of the penalty threatened against him coming also upon
them. This is the doctrine of immediate imputation." "And
when it is said that the sin of Adam is imputed to his posterity, it
is not meant that they committed his sin, or were the agents of his
f act, nor is it meant that they arc morally criminal for his transgres-
sion; but simply that in virtue of the union between him and his
descendants his sin is the judicial ground of the condemnation of
his race."' When Dr. Hodge speaks of the federal and natural
union of Adam and his posterity, respecting the natural he must
be understood to express the historic view of the question rather
than his own personal view. As a rigid representationist, he could
not think the natural relation any part of the ground on which the
guilt of Adam's sin is imputed to the race. Something might be
said for the congruity of appointing the natural head of the race its
^ legal head; but there could be nothing more than such congruity.
In this representative theory the federal headship is the sole
ground of a responsible oneness of the race with Adam. The econ-
omy is purely a legal one; and the sharing in the sin of Adam is
according to its legal character. In the above citations we have
rjocn Avhat that sharing is, and in Avhat mode it becomes actual.
By a judicial act of immediate imputation God accounts the guilt
of Adam's sin to his posterity on the ground of their legal oneness
with liim.
' Cunningham : HistoHcal TJieology, vol. i, pp. 337, 338.
' Ilodge : Systematic Theology, vol. ii, pp. 193, 195.
REPRESENTATIVE MODE OF ADAMIC GUILT. 495
3. No Demerit from the Imputation. — The theory has this con-
sequence^ that no turpitude or demerit of sin is by such imputa-
tion carried over to the offspring of Adam. It is not pretended,
not admitted even, that any thing more than the guilt of the first
sin is imputed to them. The theory sharply discriminates the de-
merit of sin and the guilt of sin. The first is personal to the
actual sinner, and is intrinsic to his own character; the second is
simply amenability to punishment, and arises from the Judicial
treatment of sin. In the above citations it is denied demerit de-
that we have any part in the criminality of Adam's sin. ^^™-
Such a view belongs to the realistic theory, from which this theory
so widely and radically dissents. It is on the ground of this dis-
tinction between the personal demerit and the guilt of sin that
Dr. Hodge maintains the possibility of such an imputation of sin
to' Christ as his doctrine of atonement requires. The transference
of demerit by imputation is denied and declared impossible.
"•'Moral character cannot be transferred." The same principle is
expressed in different places. ' And the same principle is declared
to rule the imputation of Adam's sin to the race. This may be
seen in connection with a passage above cited. Hence, when we
say that there is no demerit of the race from the immediate imputa-
tion of Adam's sin, we are thoroughly sustained by a fundamental
principle of the representative theory, and also by its very best ex-
l^osition. In another place we shall have use for the fact thus
established.
II. Alleged Proofs of the Theory.
The representative theory, just as every other, is dependent
upon its proofs. Hence their importance rises with its prominence
in the Augustinian anthropology. Naturally, therefore, all facts
and principles which promise any support are called into service
and presented with the utmost exegetical and logical skill. We
readily concede a strong plausibility to some of the arguments.
Some have so much apparent strength that the answer is not al-
ways easy. We shall not attempt so elaborate a review as these
statements might suggest or seem to require, and yet shall proceed
with the confidence of showing that the arguments are inconclu-
sive.
1. Responsibility on the Ground of Representation.— Th.\s, argu-
ment requires both the federal headship of Adam and the suffi-
ciency of such representation for the common participation in the
guilt of his sin. For the present, we proceed without questioning
' Systematic Theology, vol. ii, pp. 189, 583.
490 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
the federal headship as maintained in this theory, and first con-
sider the principle of representation, with the argument con-
structed upon it.
The argument proceeds on the principle of responsibility from
representation, and brings illustrations and proofs from
various relations of human life. The minister binds
the State; the agent, the f)rincipal; the child, the parent; the
parent, the child. In purely voluntary or conventional associa-
tions it is admitted that representation does not impose a common
moral responsibility. It is otherwise in such relations as arise in
the providential ordering and requirements of human life. Such
are the relations above specified. They are inseijarable from our
present mode of existence, and must be in the order of providence.
The principle of responsibility rules in all such instances of repre-
sentation, and therefore rules in the instance of Adam.'
The argument will not sustain the representative place of Adam
NO GROUND ^s maintained in this theory. On the ground of his
OF GUILT. federal headship it is maintained that the guilt of his
sin is justly imputed to his offspring, and constitutes in them the
ground of divine punishment. The instances of representation
adduced fall far short of any analogy for the support of any such
view. Neither guilt nor penalty is involved. If in the inter-
course of nations a minister is invested with plenipotentiul func-
tions, the State which he represents is bound by his action, and
equally when it is unwise and wrong as when it is wise and
right; but this obligation involves neither guilt nor punishment.
The same is true in all the other instances. The priiicipal is re-
sponsible for the action of his agent, so far as empowered to act for
him, but can neither be accounted guilty nor suffer punishment
for any wrong-doing of the agent. By provisions of law a father
may be held responsible for such action of his child as may involve
the pecuniary interests of others; but unless in some way a sharer
in the wrong-doing his responsibility is not in the nature of either
guilt or jiunishmenk In all such instances as we have considered
the responsibility is merely political or i^ecuniary. The law which
imposes it is purely one of economical expediency. Interests are
thus protected which otherwise might be greatly wronged. To
hold either the State, or the principal^ or the father guilty and
the subject of punishment in such cases is to depart utterly from
the plainest principles of justice and common sense. Hence this
utter lack of analogy to the representative place of Adam, as main-
' Wallace : Representative Responsibility, discourses i, ii ; Hodge : System-
atic Theology, vol. ii, pp. 196-201.
REPRESENTATIVE MODE OP ADAMIO GUILT. 497
tained in this theory, renders all such instances utterly valueless
for the argument.
Special account is made of instances of attainder, in which
treason or some other high crime is punished with instances of
confiscation of estates and political disfranchisement, attaindeu.
and in which, in the terms of the law and the Judicial procedure,
the children of the criminal, for successive generations, and even
forever, are involved in the same consequences. Any justification
of such procedure must arise from the exigencies of the govern-
ment. Such judicial measures are expedients of government, and
can have no other defense. The idea is that such an extension of
the evil consequences of treason will more effectually restrain others
from its commission. Its justification from its end is not the ques-
tion now in hand. The point we make is this: Such procedure of
government neither constitutes- the children guilty of the father's
treason nor makes the evil visited upon them in any proper sense a
punishment. It is admitted that the act of treason cannot he
charged to the children, because it is strictly personal to the high
offender; but the guilt of the act is as rigidly and exclusively per-
sonal to him as the act itself, and no more can it be charged to
them. But guilt absolutely conditions punishment. Hence, as
the children cannot be constituted guilty of the parental treason,
the evil visited upon them cannot in any proper sense of justice bu
a punishment. There is nothing in such instances which can sup-
port the representative theory.
2. Biblical Instances of Imjmtation of Sin. — Reference to a few
instances will suffice for the review of this argument. We may
name the cases of Achan, Gehazi, Dathan, and Abiram. Hodge
brings these, with many others, into the argument. ' Xo one makes
a stronger use of them. Seemingly, they sustain his argument;
but a deeper view discovers their insufficiency.
Under the divine administration suffering is visited upon fami-
lies in consequence of parental sins. This is not to be their inter-
questioned. Whether they are strictly penal is the real pretation.
question. The same insuperable difficulties of guilt and punish-
ment are present in these cases as in those under human adminis-
trations. The evil consequences, as affecting others than the actu-
ally criminal, are administered on a law of governmental expedi-
ency, not on a law of retributive justice. There is such a law
in the divine administration, as in the human. The policy m.ay be
illustrated by legitimate usages of war. Consequences cannot be
restricted to personal demerit. When suffering is even purposely
' Systematic Theologij, vol. ii, px). 198-205.
33 •
4 us SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
inflicted upon the innocent they are not accounted guilty, nor is
their suffering a punishment to them. The Jewish theocracy was
political in its functions as well as moral and religious. Nor can
all its measures and ministries be interpreted without a law of
economical expediency. Even under a theocracy men were still
men, and could be governed only as such. For rectoral ends,
and for the great purposes of the theocracy, its judicial inflictions
sometimes involved the innocent with the actual offenders, but not
as punishments on the ground of imputed guilt. Nor can such ex-
ceptional and temporary instances conclude the guilt and punish-
ment of all mankind on account of the sin of Adam as federal head
of the race.
3. More Direct Proof-Texts. — A chief text of the class is found
in God's proclamation of his name to Moses; which proclamation
is a lofty characterization of his own majesty and truth, goodness
and mercy. To all the expression of his clemency and gracious
forgiveness of sin, it is added, that he " will by no means clear the
guilty; visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children, and
upon the children's children, unto the third and to the fourth gen-
eration."' The text has special application to the sin of idolatry.
Mr. "Wesley so regarded it. Maimonides is cited for the same view.
There was in this case special reason for such visitation. The
tendency to idolatry was persistent and strong. Its restraint was
necessary to the great purposes of the theocracy. The severity of
means answered to this exigency. So we find God ordering the
utter destruction of any city whose inhabitants gave themselves to
idolatry.^ Even the cattle were to be put to the sword, and all the
property to be destroyed. This judgment transcended the possi-
bility of guilt in the subjects of its infliction, and therefore could
not be to them a punishment. The proper interpretation is upon
the same principles on which we interpreted the instances of im-
putation previously considered. Such extreme measures were nec-
essary to the great ends of the theocracy, and permissible on that
ground, but could not be punishments to any who were not actual
sharers in the sinning. In this manner we interpret the "visit-
ing the iniquities of the fathers upon the children."
The standard text is from Paul.' Since the time of Augustine
THE STAND- ^ ^^^^ ^^^ ^^cu thc grcat text in doctrinal anthropology.
AKDTExr. Whether it is the formally exact expression of doctrine
which its dogmatic use assumes, may fairly be questioned. In the
Augustinian anthropology it is equally the reliance of both the
realistic and representative schools. Each is sure of its full sup-
• Exod. xxxiv, 7. "^ Deut. siii, 12-18. ^ Eom. v, 12-19.
REPRESENTATIVE MODE OF ADAMIC GUILT. 499
port, and, equally, that it gives no suppoi't to the other; indeed,
that it refutes the other. But, with their profound difference, it
cannot be the doctrinal ground of both. We may reasonably infer
that it supports neither. Arminianism can fairly interpret the
text consistently with its own anthropology, though in some facts
it differs profoundly from the Augustinian.' Respecting individ-
ual expositors of the text, we rarely find any two in full agreement.'^
This is the case with expositors of the same school of anthropology.
A text so open to diverse and opposing interpretations cannot in
itself be the determining ground of any particular doctrine. Such
facts strongly suggest the prudence of less dogmatism in its doc-
trinal use. If the passage is taken as formally exact and scientific
in doctrinal statement, no proper consistency of its several parts
can be attained; nor can it as a whole be brought into harmony
with any system of theology. While seemingly exact and definite
in doctrinal expression, it should rather be taken in a popular
sense. This is the view of Knapp.^ His view is appropriated by
McClintock and Strong." The passage is a popular statement of
great facts for the expression and illustration of a ruling idea — the
abounding fullness of grace and life in the redemptive mediation of
Christ.
The diversities of interpretation, and particularly the opposing
interpretations of the realistic and representative jj^ proof op
schools, with their reciprocal refutations, deny to this adamic sin.
text any sufficient proof of a common sharing in the guilt of Adam's
sin, as held in the Augustinian anthropology. After a searching
study we are satisfied that it does not contain the proof of such a
doctrine.^
4. Imputation of the Righteousness of Christ. — From an im-
putation of the I'ighteousness of Christ it is often attempted to
f prove the imputation of Adam^s sin to the race, as maintained in
,the representative theory. Theoretically, the two imputations
'stand together in the Federal theology. This theology requires
both, and also the federal headship respectively of Adam and
Christ. These federal headships are the ground of the imputation
' As representatives of interpretation in the realistic, representative, and
Arminian schools, we may instance Shedd, Hodge, and Whedon, in their re-
spective Commentaries on Romans.
' Many instances of opposing views are given in the respective Commentaries
of Stewart and Meyer on Romans.
^Christian Theology, sec. Ixxvi, iii. '^Cyclopaedia, "Imputation."
^ We think this study important, but the extent of its necessary elaboration
renders it inappropriate for a place in the body of our work. It wiU be given
in an appendix to the second volume.
500 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
respectively of the siu of Adiira and the righteousness of Christ.
In the present argument for the representative theory the imputa-
tion of the righteousness of Christ is iwsumed as a fact, and from
this fact is inferred the imputation of Adam's sin to all men. It
may further bo said tliat the argument also intends the rindication
of this imputation. Two questions are thus raised: Is the assumed
imputation of the righteousness of Christ a fact? and, if a fact,
would it warrant the inference respecting the imputation of
Adam's sin? In considering these questions we may change their
order.
There is a profound difference between the immediate imputa-
tion of siu as a ground of punishment and the imme-
NO TINDICA- . . *= , ^
TioN OF THE dlatc imputatiou of righteousness as the ground of
THEORY. reward. The representative theory can say much for
the latter as the outflowing of the divine grace and love; but what
can it say for the former? Here no appeal can be made to the
divine love. Nor can there be any appeal to the divine Justice.
The theory denies all actual sharing in the sin of Adam as a ground
of demerit. This is one of its strong points against the realistic
theory. The idea of such desert is excluded by the nature of the
imputation as immediate. The imputed sin is the very first ground
of punitive desert. Hence the theory means a purely gratuitous im-
position of guilt upon all men. Such an imputation could have no
warrant or vindication in the imputation of the righteousness of
Christ. The profound difference of the two precludes both the
warrant and the vindication. The words of Shedd are forceful and
to the point: " The doctrine of a gratuitous justification is intelli-
gible and rational; but the doctrine of a gratuitous damnation is
unintelligible and absurd." '
It is thus manifest that the imputation of the righteousness of
Christ, even if a truth of the Scriptures, could neither
puTATioN OF suj^port nor vindicate a purely gratuitous imputation
RiiiHTF,ous- of Adam's sin to the race as the judicial ground of de-
pravity and death. There is, in truth, no such imputa-
tion of the righteousness of Christ as this theory maintains, and
hence the argument attempted upon its assumption is utterly
groundless. However, the proper place for this question of impu-
tation is in connection with the doctrine of justification.
III. Objections to the Theory.
So far we have considered the arguments which the representa-
tive theory brings in proof of the immediate imputation of Adam's
' History of Christian Doctrine, vol. ii, p. 163.
REPRESENTATIVE MODE OF ADAMIC GUILT. 501
sin as the judicial or peual ground of the common depravity of
human nature. Beyond our answer to these arguments there are
a few objections to the theory which must not be omitted.
1. jVo Such Headship of Adam. — It is not the natural headship
which is here questioned; it is the federal or forensic headship, as
maintained in the representative theory. The deeper sense of the
idea is that of a covenant between God and Adam, with headship.
mutual stipulations of duty and promise — duty on the human side
and promise on the divine side. In the obligation of duty Adam
should not only answer for himself, but also represent his offspring,
BO that they should fully share in the righteousness and reward of
his obedience, or equally in the guilt and punishment of his dis-
obedience. So, on his side God should reward or punish Adam,
personally, and equally his offspring as represented by him, just as
he might fulfill or violate the obligation of duty as stipulated in
the covenant. The implied and the frequently expressed part of
Adam in such a covenant would clearly have been a usurpation.
Nor is it to be thought that God could have recognized in him any
such right, or have entered into any such stipulations with him on
its unwarranted assumption. All that can reasonably be meant is,
that in the primitive probation God, solely in his own agency, in-
stituted a federal economy, so that the trial of Adam should, on
the principle of representation, be the decisive trial of the race.
The irrational idea of Adam's part in the covenant is thus excluded,
but the fundamental principle remains, and the consequences to
the race are the very same. On his obedience, all would have
shared witli him in the reward of immortality, confirmed holiness,
and eternal blessedness. As he sinned, all share with him the full
measure of guilt and loss, and the same desert of an eternal penal
doom. " Every thing promised to him was promised to them. And
every thing threatened against him, in case of transgression, was
threatened against them." ' This is but the repetition, in sub-
stance, of what many others have said. As Adam sinned, very
naturally the penal consequences of his headship have come into
great doctrinal prominence, and received almost exclusive attention;
but the principle of reward, which, on his obedience, would have
secured to the race all the blessings promised him, is just as central
to this federal economy as the principle of penal retribution. Thus
the trial of the race was in Adam, with the judicial consequence
of an eternal blessedness or an eternal penal doom.
There is little foundation for so great a structure. Appeal is
made to the Mosaic narrative of the Adamic probation. Many
' Hodge : Systematic Theology, vol. ii, p. 121.
502 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
things said to Adam and Eve must have had respect to their ofE-
No GROUND IN Spring, and the race is involved in many and great evils
8CRIPTUUE. through their sin and fall.' This is admitted. We have
previously maintained the same. But the real question is whether
such consequences are punishments, with their judicial ground in the
sin of Adam as representative of the race. To assume that they are is
to assume tlie full doctrinal content of the federal headship. This,
however, is the question in issue, and its assumption will not answer
the demand for proof. The proof of such a federal headship is not in
the Mosaic narrative. Proof is attempted from the words of Ilosea
by rendering the text, " But they like Adam have transgressed the
covenant." " There is really no proof, because ''like men," as given
in the Authorized Version, may be the true rendering. Even the
rendering, " like Adam," must utterly fail to carry with it the full
sense of the Adamic covenant in the representative theory. Much
use is here made of the two great texts of Paul,' which we have
previously considered. But as we found in them no proof of a
common participation in the sin of Adam through imputation, so
they can give no proof of an Adamic covenant which is maintained
as the essential ground of such imputation.
There is no federal headship of Adam on which all men equally
SCRIPTURE "^itl^ himself share the guilt of his sin. On the Cal-
AGAiNSTiT. vinistic views of this question Pope says: "But such
speculations as these stand or fall with the general principle of a
specific covenant with Adam as representing his posterity, a cove-
nant of which the Scripture does not speak." * The vital connec-
tion of i^ersonal agency and moral responsibility is too thoroughly
pervasive of the Scriptures to allow any place therein for a federal
headship which sunders that connection and makes all men sharers
in the sin of Adam. " This is so little agreeable to that distinct
agency which enters into the very notion of an accountable being,
that it cannot be maintained, and it destroys the sound distinction
between original and actual sin. It asserts, indeed, the imputation
of the actual commission of Adam's sin to his descendants, which
is false in fact ; makes us stand chargeable with the full latitude of
his transgression, and all its attendant circumstances; and consti-
tutes us, separate from all actual voluntary offense, equally guilty
with him, all which are repugnant equally to our consciousness and
to the equity of the case."' The force of this argument is not in
the least weakened by the failure of Mr. Watson to anticipate the
' Gen. i, 26-28 ; iii, 16-19. «Ho8. vi, 7.
='Rora. V, 12-19; 1 Cor. xv, 21, 22. * Christian Theology, vol. ii, p. 78.
'' Watsou : Theological Institutes, vol. ii, p. 53.
REPRESENTATIVE MODE OF ADAMIC GUILT. 503
more recent Calvinistic distinction between the guilt and the act of
Adam's sin in the imputation. It is the ethical element involved in
the imputation that gives the chief weight to his objection.
2. Siipersechire of a Common Probation. — In such a covenant as
the representative theory maintains the obedience of Adam would
have secured to the race severally, and without any personal trial,
eternal holiness and blessedness. " The first covenant made with
man was a covenant of works, wherein life was jjromised to Adam
and in him to his posterity, upon condition of perfect and personal
obedience."' Of course, in such a covenant the contingency of
universal righteousness and blessedness must answer to the con-
tingency of universal guilt and perdition. We have previously
shown how fully the latter is set forth in the maintenance of the
representative theory. The former is just as really and fully a part
of the theory, and is the part specially set forth in the above cita-
tion. Adam represented all men in his own probation. " They
stood their probation in him, and do not stand each man for him-
self."^
The theory thus j)laces the probation of the race in Adam, with
the contingency of a universal and eternal blessedness
° '' . PROBATION OF
or misery, just as he might fulfill or transgress the the race in
divine command. There is no ground in either reason, '^"'^'*^-
analogy, or Scripture for such a position. It assumes that all men
would have been constituted personally righteous by the imputation
of the personal righteousness of Adam, and so have been rewarded
with eternal blessedness. This is a most exaggerated account of
the temporary obedience of one man, and, in the breadth of its pos-
sible blessings, lifts it into rivalry with the redemptive mediation
of Christ.
3. Guilt and Punishment of the Innocent. — This theory denies all
direct sharing of the race in either the act or the demerit of Adam's
sin. This is its distinction from the realistic theory, which, in its
higher form, asserts both. As the race had no j)art in the agency of
Adam, his sinning could have no immediate consequence of demerit
and guilt upon them as upon himself. Hence, until the judicial act
of immediate imputation, all must have been innocent in fact, and
must have so appeared even in the view of the divine justice as it
proceeded to cover them with the guilt of an alien sin, a sin in no
sense their own, and then on the ground of such gratuitous guilt to
inflict upon them the penalty of moral depravity and death. Thus
' The Westminster Confession, chap, vii, sec. ii.
^ Hodge : Si/stematic Theology, vol, ii, p. 133. Also Witsius : The Covenants,
vol. i, p. 36; Eaymond : Systematic Theology, vol. ii, pp. 104, 105.
504 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
the race, as yet iuuocent iu fact, is made the subject of guilt and )
puuishmeut.
4. lac/ifiuns Guilt of Ihc Race. — The immediate imputation of t
sin is by its own dc'linition simply the accounting to all men the I'
guilt of a sin which is confessedly not their own. They had no
part in the commission of that sin. The imputed guilt has no
ground of demerit in them. In a merely putative mode, and with-
out any desert in themselves, all men are accounted amenable to
the divine punishment. This utter separation of the guilt from
demerit, this absolute sundering of the reatus pcencB from the
reatus culpce, must reduce the guilt of the race to a merely factitious
character. The word factitious is here used in no light sense. On
the supposition of such imputed guilt, we have simply pointed out
its unavoidable character. Further, it is only by an artificial
measure of law that the one sin of one man could be made to
render equally guilty with himself all the millions of the race.
The theory must here keep within its own limit, and assume
nothing from the realistic theory. There was the one representa-
tive and the one sin, with its own intrinsic demerit. The intrin-
sic guilt was in just the measure of this demerit. Who shall say
that it was sufficient for an eternal penal doom of the race in the
retribution of the divine justice? How, then, could it be made to
cover every soul of the race with a guilt equal to that of the sinning
representative, except by an artificial measure of law ?
5. A DarJcer Problem of Evil. — We have previously shoAvn that
this theory assumes to vindicate the divine providence in the exist-
ence of so great an evil as the common native depravity by accounting
it a punishment justly inflicted upon the race. We are born in a "^
state of moral ruin, and the evil is very great. Hence it must be a
punishment ; for, otherwise, it could not be reconciled with the
justice and goodness of God. But if a j)unishment, it must have
its ground in guilt. The principle is accepted, at least by impli- '
cation, that '^no just constitution will punish the innocent." We
have seen how it is attempted to secure the principle in this case.
The penal infliction of depravity is anticipated by the imi^utation ^
of the guilt of an alien sin to the race. But no such putative
ground could justify the penal infliction. Nor is the native evil j •
any less by calling it a punishment. There is no relief in account-
ing the innocent guilty in anticipation of such a penal infliction.
There is a double and deeper wrong. Verily, there is no theodicy
in this doctrine, but only a darker problem of evil.
GENETIC LAW OF NATIVE DEPRAVITY. 505
CHAPTER XL
GEISTETIC LAW OF NATIVE DEPRAVITY.
We have sufficiently reviewed the theory of native depravity
whicli accounts it a penal retribution on the ground of a common
participation in the sin of Adam, and have found it nnsustained in
either the realistic or representative mode of such participation.
The disproof of this theory does not affect the reality of native de-
pravity, but leaves it to be accounted for in some other mode.
'^There is an entirely sufficient account in the law of genetic trans-
mission. The corruption of the progenitors of the race is thus
transmitted to their offspring. The uniformity with which this
law is accepted in doctrinal anthropology greatly favors the theory
which makes it the account of the common native depravity.
I. Genesis of Parental Quality.
1. Realitij of the Law. — It is a law of organic life that every
thing produces its own kind. This law was divinely instituted at
the very beginning of life.' It has determined the results of prop-
agation through all the geological ages and in all organic orders.
It is the determining law of species, and gives us the i.,^^- op ~_^^
orderly forms of life. If it were made known simply life.
that life is propagated in other worlds, sober science would promptly
affirm the reigning of the same law. The offspring are a reproduc-
tion of the parentage, not only in anatomical structure and physi-
ological constitution, but also in the qualities of instinct and dis-
position. This is clearly seen in the higher animal orders. The
lion of the present is the lion of all previous generations. The
ferocity of the tiger is a derivation from its earliest parentage.
The meekness and gentleness of the lamb of to-day were in the
blood of the paschal lamb many ages ago. Man himself is the
most striking exemplification of this law. Historically, the diver-
sities of human condition are very great. There is a vast scale from
the lowest barbarism up to the highest civilization. The habits of
life engendered by location and the modes of subsistence widely
differ. Governments, customs, religions, all things which strike
the deepest into the nature of man, equally differ. Yet in all the
» Gen. i, 11, 13.
50G SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
constitutive qualities of humanity man is always and every-where
the same. This universal and abiding identity is a genetic trans-
mission from the progenitors of the race down through all its gen-
erations.
2. Resjjecting the Transmission of Ailamic Holiness. — On the
obedience of Adam and the maintenance of his own holiness of nat-
ure, his offspring would have received their life and begun their
probation in the same primitive holiness. There would still have
been the possible lapse of individuals, with the corruption of their
own nature and the consequent depravity of their offspring ; but
apart from this contingency, or so far as the Adamic connection is
concerned, all would have been born in the primitive holiness. Under
what law would such have been the consequence? Unquestionably,
the law of genetic transmission. Any notion of an immediate
imputation of Adam's personal righteousness to his offspring as the
judicial ground of their birth in subjective holiness is utterly ground-
less. It must assume that without such imputation all must have ,
been born in depravity, which at once contradicts the determining
law of propagation and the holiness and goodness of God. There is
no requirement for any other law than that of genetic transmission.
There is no place for any other.
3. Sufficient Account of Native Depravity. — As the law of genetic
transmission rules in all the forms of projDugated life and determines
the likeness of the offspring to the jDarentage, and as it was sufficient
for the transmission of the primitive holiness to all the race, it must
be a sufficient account of the common native depravity. To deny
this sufficiency is to assume that simply under the law of nature the
moral corruption of Adam would not have been transmitted to his off-
spring, and consequently that they must have been born in holiness.
To assume an intervention of retributive justice, on the ground of a
common participation in the sin of Adam, as the only sufficient
account of the universal native dej^ravity, is to imply the same
results. The implication is utterly in error. Simply under the law
of nature the corruption of Adam must have been transmitted to
his offspring, and consequently they could not have been born in
scKFiciKNCY ^lic primitlvc holiness. All this is really conceded by
co.vcEDKD gnch as hold the common depravity to be a punishment.
We have previously seen that this view of punishment is maintained
in order to vindicate the divine providence in the existence of so
great an evil. But except for the efficiency of the law of nature
which determines the likeness of the offspring to the parentage there
would have been no common evil of depravity requiring the divine
vindication. Why account the corruption of human nature a pun-
GENETIC LAW OF NATIVE DEPRAVITY. 507
isliment when it exists in the fullest accord with all the analogies
of propagation ? Punishment is not thought of in any other in-
stance of likeness in the offspring to the parentage. The sufficient
account is in the law of genetic transmission. There is no require-
ment in either nature or Scripture or reason for any other.
Seemingly, this law of genetic transmission should rule in the
instance of regenerate or sanctified parents, and deter-
mine the subjective holiness of their offspring. Yet the lifk not
truth of a common native depravity, as previously transmissi-
maintained, forbids this inference. Why should the
Adamic connection rule in such instances instead of the immediate
connection ? This question naturally arises ; nor is it without per-
plexity. It might be answered, that in the present life the sanctifi-
jcation is not complete ; that a measure of depravity remains in the
regenerate. This doctrine is formulated in most orthodox creeds,
and hence furnishes the ground for such an answer as we here sug-
gest. However, it is one which cannot be given by such as hold
the doctrine of entire sanctification, and maintain that there are
actual instances of such sanctification. There is a further answer,
which fully accords with the former doctrine, and is seemingly the
only one in accord with the latter. The regenerate or sanctified
state is specially a gracious state, and not of the original constitu-
tion of man. It is provided for in the economy of redemption, and
achieved through the supernatural agency of the Holy Spirit, and
therefore is not transmissible through natural generation. The lim-
itations of such a law are as real in the completely sanctified as in
the regenerate in whom the rudiments of depravity may still re-
main. There is such a law in nature. The fruit of the graftf.
produces, not its own special quality, but that of the natural stock. '
II. The Teue Law of Depravity.
If this is not the true law of native depravity, the Scripture proofs
of depravity itself must be at fault, and the Catholic doctrine of its
transmission must be in error. It will be easy to justify these
statements.
1. TJie Scripture Doctrine. — The creeds which formulate a doc-
trine of native depxavity, and the theologians who maintain such a
doctrine, both appeal to the Scriptures for its proof. Many of the
evidences thus adduced, and especially the more explicit, rest on
the ground of a genetic transmission of depravity. Eeference to a
few texts will show this. " Who can bring a clean thing out of an
unclean ? not one." ' An unclean vessel defiles its content. This
' Job xiv, 4,
508 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
deeper idea of the text illustrates the law of native depravity. The
reference in the close connection is to natural generation or birth
as the source of depravity. " Behold, I was shapen in iniquity ;
and in sin did my mother conceive me."' There is in this text
the sense of native evil, but an evil inherited through natural gen-
eration. The same truth is given in the profound words of our
Lord on the necessity for spiritual regeneration.'' The necessity
lies in the fact that "that which is born of the flesh is flesh."
This means the inheritance of a corrupt nature through natural!
generation. Thus the leading texts which prove the reality of
native depravity equally prove its genetic transmission.
2. TJie Catholic Doctrine. — No element of the Augustinian an-
thropology has been more fully or uniformly asserted than the
genetic transmission of depravity. There is no reserve in Augus-
tine's expression of his own view. In nothing have his followers in
doctrine more closely adhered to his teaching. This element is
common to the doctrinal formulas of original sin in the creeds of the
Churches : the Eastern or Greek Church ; ' the Roman Catholic
Church;^ Protestant Churches.^ The eminent theologians of the
Churches follow in the maintenance of this doctrine. There is no
need of a law of penal retribution to account for a result which is
thus accounted for simply on a law of nature.
If it should be said that the genetic transmission of Adamic
depravity is simply the mode in which the divine iudg-'
TRANSMISSION L J I J J O j
NOT A MoDK mcnt is executed, the answer is at hand. The position,!
OF PENALTY. |^y. j^gyi^able impHcatiou, denies that the law of prop-i
agation which determines the likeness of the offspring to the par-
entage was original to the constitution of man, while confessedly
original with all other living orders, and assumes that it was subse-
quently ordained for man simj^ly as the means of a judicial infliction
of depravity upon all. Such implications contradict all relative
facts, and utterly discredit the principle which involves them.
3. Tlie Arminian Doctrine. — Arminianism has not the exact and
comprehensive formulations of doctrine which we fiftd in some
other systems, as, for instance, the Lutheran and the Reformed or
Calvinistic. No general synod or council has ever taken this work
in hand ; yet in other modes the leading doctrines of the system
iPsa. li, 5. » John iii, 3-7.
^ The Orthodox Confession, Q. 24 ; Larger Catechism, Q. 168.
■• Decree of the Council of Trent concerning Original Sin.
' The Augsburg Confession, article ii ; The Belgic Confession, article xv ; The
Thirty-nine Articles of the Church of England, article ix ; The Synod of Dort,
De Hominis Corruptione, sec. ii ; The Westminster Confession, chap, vi, sec. iii.
GENETIC LAW OF NATIVE DEPRAVITY. 509
are set fortli with satisfactory clearness and fullness. Respecting
the genetic transmission of depravity there is full accordance with
other systems of theology. Expressions are frequently ^he common
met, particularly in the older Arminianism, and in the '^iew.
. Wesleyan, which, at least, imply a judicial ground of the common de-
pravit}^, but never in contradiction to its genetic mode. The tendency
is toward the recognition of this law as the sufficient and whole account
of it.' This is definitely and explicitly the view of Dr. Whedon.'
On the present question our own article is very definite. Original
or birth sin " is the corruption of the nature of every q^r seventh
man, that naturally is engendered of the offspring of article.
Adam." ^ There is neither suggestion nor implication of any judi-
cial ground of the common depravity. The emphasis placed upon
the law of propagation from Adam down through the whole race
excludes the sense of a penal infliction on the ground of a common
Adamic sin. This sense would require us to hold the propagation
simply as the mode of the penal infliction ; but, as previously pointed
out, such proi^agation is determined by a law of nature which is com-
mon to all orders of propagated life, and therefore cannot be the mere
mode of a punishment in any specific case. On any consistent inter-
pretation, the article accounts the common native depravity simply
a genetic transmission. This is the specific doctrinal formula of the
Methodist Episcopal Church on this question. The same article is
held by the other Methodist Churches. We know not any exception.
4. Unaffected Reality of Native Depravity. — The reality of na-
tive depravity is not involved in the question of its penal infiiction.
Those who hold this view equally hold its genetic transmission;
and both its reality and character are determined by the law of
propagation. As the offspring of Adam, we all inherit the de-
pravity of nature into which he fell through transgression. It is
no less a reality than if a judicial infliction. The noxious quality
' of a poisonous tree is just as real, and the very same, under the
law of propagation as if the immediate product of a divine maledic-
tion. The same is true of the ferocity of a tiger propagated from
a parentage synchronical with Adam. So the common depravity
genetically transmitted is just as real, and the very same in its own
nature, as if a penal retribution. Its reality is not placed in any
doubt by the disproof of its judicial ground.
' Arminius : Writings, vol. i, p. 486 ; Hill : Divinity, pp. 398-400 ; Shedd :
History of Christian Doctrine, vol. ii, pp. 178-186.
'^Methodist Quarterhj Review, 1861, pp. 649-651. Also Raymond : Systematic
Theology, vol. ii, pp. 109-336 ; Summers : Systematic Theology, vol. ii, p. 46.
^Article vii.
o 1 0 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
CHAPTER XII.
DOCTRIira OF NATIVE DEMERIT.
In a previous analysis of original sin, as the formula is main-
tained in the Augustinian authroiiology, we found three distinct
clonients: a common guilt of Adam's sin, the corruption of human
nature as a judicial infliction on the ground of that sin, and the
intrinsic sinfulness and demerit of the common native depravity.
"We have disposed of the former two questions, but the third is still
on hand. Xor can it be regarded as merely incidental in its re-
lation to systematic theology, but, when properly apprehended,
must be viewed as central and determining. Infralapsarian Cal-
vinism, now the prevalent form, can have no standing without it;
Arminianism, no consistent and sure ground with it. It conditions
the decree of election and rei^robation in the former system, and
contradicts the fundamental principles of the latter. Such doc-
trinal con;:equences of the question will fully appear in its discus-
sion, and therefore require no further statement here.
The doctrine is, that native depravity, in its own intrinsic nature,
and wholly irrespective of any personal moral action, is
THE DOCTRINE. , , . ' . , , '• • , i , , , t . ,
truly sin, or so sin as to liave in itself the desert of pun-
ishment. On the ground of inherited depravity every soul is ame-
nable to the divine retribution, just as for any free sinful deed. This
statement of the doctrine will be fully justified under the next head.
The strength of Augustine's own view of the common native sin-
fulness, in the sense of punitive desert, is quite famil-
AUGUSTINIAN. ,
iar to students of theology. He has left no room for
any uncertainty. On no question was he more earnest or intense.
He pronounced the whole human race, in their natural state,
as consequent upon the sin of Adam, one mass of perdition
(massa perditionis).* The creeds and confessions, whose an-
thropology is constructed upon Augustinian ground, contain the
same doctrine. Some of the stronger terms may be avoided, but
the doctrine of a native sinfulness and damnableness is equally pres-
ent. " This disease, or original fault, is truly sin, condemning and
bringing eternal death." * Original sin, the corruption of our nat-
' Works (Migne's), vol. x, p. 403,
' The Aagsbnrg Confession, article ii.
DOCTRINE OF NATIVE DEMERIT. 511
lire and a hereditary disease, " is sufficient to condemn all man-
kind." ' Original sin, the fault and corruption of the nature of every
one, naturally engendered of the offsjoring of Adam, " in every per-
son born into the world it deserveth God's wrath and damnation." '^
Our native corruption, as really as our actual sin, " doth, in its
own nature, bring guilt upon the sinner, whereby he is bound over
to the wrath of God and curse of tlie law, and so made subject to
death, with all miseries spiritual, temporal, and eternal."' Many
authorities, both confessional and individual, might easily be added.
I. Alleged Proofs of the Doctrine.
Very naturally, a doctrine so central to the Calvinistic system,
and at once so necessary to the inf ralapsarian decree of election and
reprobation, and so entirely sufficient for such decree, has been
most vigorously maintained. No resource of proof has been omitted.
The arguments adduced must now be questioned.
1. More Direct Scripture Proofs. — Native depravity is called
sin. This is not disputed. The instances given are clear and
decisive." The fact, however, is inconclusive of the dkpratity
position. It could be conclusive only on the ground called six.
that sin — afiaQTia — always contains the sense of demerit. This is
not the case; and, as in other applications it is used without this
sense, so may it be in these instances. There are many instances
of a metonymic use, of which a very few will suffice. The golden
calf worshiped in the idolatry of Israel is called sin.^ It cannot
mean that this calf was itself the subject of guilt or demerit, but
simply the object of a sinful worship. Also the sin-offering is fre-
quently called sin." Such offerings are called sin, not on the
ground of any demerit in themselves, but simply from their relation
to the forgiveness of sin. In a like metonymy our native deprav-
ity may properly be called sin for the reason of its tendency to
actual sin, but without demerit simply as a subjective state. Such
a sense will give the meaning of Paul in many instances of its use.'
That depravity as a native state is called sin is, therefore, incon-
clusive of its intrinsic demerit.
The great passage of Paul, which we found in such full use on
the part of both realists and representationists for the proof of a
' The Belgic Confession, article xv.
' Articles of the Church of England, article ix.
^ The Westminster Confession, chap. vi.
*Psa. li, 5 ; Rom. vii, 8, 17. ^Deut. ix, 21.
*Exod. xxix, 14 ; Lev. iv, 24; 2 Cor. v, 21.
' Rom. vi, 2, 6, 12, 14 ; vii, 8-17.
512 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
common participation in the sin of A(^am, is equally in use here.'
GREAT TKXT 'i^c discussiou of its doctrinal sense in the former place
OF PAUL. leaves little requirement for additional treatment. We
there found it insufficient for the proof of a common guilt of
Adam's sin in either the realistic or representative mode. Much
more must it fail to prove the intrinsic demerit of the common
native depravity. Really, the text has no bearing, certainly no
direct bearing, on this question. It fairly raises the question
of a common participation in the guilt of Adam's sin, but only
remotely can it even suggest the question of demerit in the com-
mon depravity inherited from him. It furnishes no proof of such
demerit.
A text of chief reliance is found in the words of Paul: "and
ciiiLDRFN- OF ^crc by nature the children of wrath, even as others.""
wiiATH. This was the state of the Jew, as of the Gentile. All
alike were by nature the children of wrath. Being children of
wrath clearly conveys the sense of guilt and condemnation, amena-
bility to the divine punishment. Hence the ground of this ex-
posure is the real question. It lies in the sense of the term nature:
"and were by nature — (^voet — the children of wrath."' Does the
term here mean the corruption of nature with which we are born,
or the habit of life formed through the indulgence of its impulses?
The former is the view of such as find in it the proof of native de-
merit. Their argument must limit itself to the nature with which
we are born, and may not include "our conversation in times past
in the lusts of our flesh, fulfilling the desires of the flesh and the
mind;" for all this belongs to the actual sinful life. Is it true,
then, that tlie nature in which we are born, and before any evil act
through its impulse, or any spontaneous activity, has in itself the
desert of an eternal penal wrath ? The proof is not in this text. Even
admitting that 0i'(7/f might mean our native depravity, it is yet no
necessary sense; indeed, would be a very rare sense. Further,
after such a portrayal of the actual sinful life in the j^reccding
connection, it Avould be very singular for Paul, without any inti-
mation, or even the transition into a new sentence, wholly to
restrict his thought to native depravity as the ground of a common
judicial v/rath. It is far more consistent with the whole paseage '
to give to (l)vaig the sense of a second nature or habit of life formed
througli the indulgence of our native tendencies to evil. This ac-
cords with the interpretation of Dr. Clarke, who holds the doc-
trine of original sin, but denies both the sense and the proof of it
in this term.* Our actual sins, as portrayed by Paul, and which
' Rom. V, 12-19. ^Eph. ii, 3. 'Eph. ii, 1-3. * Commentanj, iu loc.
DOCTRINE OF NATIVE DEMERIT. 513
fulfill the tendencies of our corrupt nature, are the real ground of
the divine wrath.'
Proof is attempted from the sense of avoixia in distinction from'
duaQria: " for sin is the transgression of the law " — anomia and
Kal 7] ajiagria earlv r] dvojjLla.^ By rendering the latter hamartia.
term into lawlessness, it is assumed to be applicable to our nature
in its native depravity, and to declare it sinful in the sense of de-
merit, just as in the case of a sinful act. " When John says, ' Sin
is the transgression of the law' ('and sin is lawlessness'), the
Catechism cannot be far wrong in understanding him thus: ' Sin
is any want of comformity to, or transgression of, the law of God.'
Thus the principle out of which the action springs is sinful, as well
as the action itself. " ^ This is given as a specimen of the argu-
ment. It is in the following of many Calvinistic examples. Na-
tive depravity is sin in the sense of demerit because it is not in
conformity with the divine law. The argument is without any
valid ground. The definitions and uses of d^agrta and dvojua
, neither warrant nor allow the assumed specific sense of the latter.
It as fully expresses actual sin as the former, and has no more ap-
plicability to a mere nature.* In this particular instance the one
term defines the other, and the two are identical in sense.'* Each
expresses sinful doing — iroiwv with the former term, -noiel with the
latter. Such sin is restrictedly personal ethical doing, and cannot
be the sin of a mere nature. It follows that the present argument
for native demerit is utterly groundless and void. Thus all the
more direct Scripture proofs fail.
2. A Metaphysical Argu7nent. — Dr. Shedd maintains the doc-
trine of a metaphysical sin, a sin of our nature below ^ metaphys-
all actual sin, before the actual and the only sufficient i^alsin.
cause of it. This doctrine he supports with the great names of
Augustine, Calvin, Turrettin, Owen, Edwards." It is readily con-
ceded that this form of sin lies beloAV consciousness. The argu-
ment, therefore, must proceed upon some fundamental principle.
It really proceeds upon the principle of causation: every phenom-
enon or event must have a sufficient cause. Properties of bodies
must have a ground in material substance; facts of psychology, a
' "WTiedon : Commentary, in loc. ^ 1 John iii, 4.
^ Summers : System.atic Theology, vol. ii, p. 53.
* Cremer : Lexicon of New Testament Greek ; Thayer : Greek-English Lexicon
of the New Testament.
^ Ebrard : Commentary on St. John's Epistles, p. 333 ; Haupt : The First
Epistle of John, p. 171 ; Meyer : Commentary, in loc.
•" Theological Essays, pp. 213-315.
34
o 1 ; SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
source or cause in mind. The same law of thought requires a siu- ]
ful nature as the only sufficient cause of sinful action.'
The principle of causation in which the argument is grounded is
CAUSE OK thoroughly valid; but the minor premise, that only a
ACTUAL SIX. sinful nature is sufficient cause to sinful action, is a
material fallacy. The fallacy is the more manifest as the sinful-
ness of the nature is interpreted in the sense of punitive demerit.
If valid in this sense, there must have been, not only a corrupt
nature, but also a guilty nature before there could have been any
actual sin. This inevitable implication utterly disproves the doc-
trine which involves it. It is not in any case the previous merit
or demerit of an agent that determines the ethical character of a
present deed. Such deed is good or bad from its own relation to
the divine law. Native depravity is necessary to account for the|
universality of actual sin, as we have previously maintained; but
the demerit of this depravity is not so necessary. Its incitements i
to sinful action are precisely the same without this ethical quality |
that they would be with it; therefore this quality can have no part
in any account of actual sin wliicli the common native depravity
must render.
3. Argument from Cliridian Consciousness. — In the usual form
of tliis argument it is maintained that Christians, and deeply awak-
ened persons as well, are profoundly conscious of a sinful nature,
and therefore have such a nature. There is an invalidating error
respecting the alleged consciousness. We are conscious of sponta-
neous incitements to evil, but not of the nature out of which they
spring. Hence consciousness itself can allege no ethical quality of
this nature. In order to avoid this fallacy Dr. Shedd has recast
the argument and presented it in a new form. The mind reaches
the nature through the facts of consciousness, and as the necessary
account of them. The mode is valid in both science and philos-
ophy, and equally valid in doctrinal anthropology. When we take
into rational thought the many facts of evil which reveal themselves
in our consciousness, "that we may look at them, and find the
origin and first cause of them, then we are obliged to assume a
principle below them all, to infer a nature back of them all. Thus,
this sinful nature is an inference, an assumption, or, to use a word
borrowed from geometr}', a jwstidafe, which the mind is obliged to
grant, in order to find a key that will unlock and explain its own
experience.'"' In reply to any objection against the truth or cer-
tainty of such inference, the answer proceeds upon the same prin-
ciple which underlies the aliove reasoning. When tlie result of
' Theological Essays, pp. 221-229. ''Ibid., p. 226.
DOCTRINE OF NATIVE DEMERIT. 515
such a rational inquiry forces itself upon tlie acceptance of the
mindj it must be the truth in the case. "If ifc is not so, then a
lie has been built into the very structure of the mind, and it is not
to be trusted in regard to any a priori truth."'
The argument is based on the assumed truthfulness of our cog-
nitions when reached according to the laws of thought.
° " GROUND OF
Our faculties were divinely given for the purj)ose of the argu-
knowledge, and, when properly used, do not deceive ^^^'^'
us. Things are as we cognize them. The doctrine is thoroughly
valid within the limit of primary or axiomatic truths, but not
beyond them. The present argument for native sinfulness goes
beyond the sphere of primary truths into the inductive. The cor-
ruption of human nature, as the necessary account of the universal
tendency to evil, is a very sure inductive truth; but the intrinsic
sinfulness or demerit of that nature is not such a truth. The
guilt of the nature has nothing to do with its tendency to evil, and
therefore is wholly without inductive warrant from this tendency.
Much less is its reality warranted by any axiomatic principle. It is
not a truth which the mind must accept. Many reject it, however
clearly set before them. Many, after the profoundest study and
with an intense Christian consciousness, reject it.
Nothing is gained for the argument by an appeal to the affirma-
tions of conscience. These affirmations have no more uniformity
than the results of induction. Many, with a profound moral con-
sciousness and a painful sense of evil tendencies, have no sense of
native demerit. The conscience of some has no infallibility for
others; has no infallibility for the truth.
There is no principle which validates all the deliverances of con-
science, as facts most fully prove. Through deficient the conclu-
analysis the facts of consciousness may be mistaken. ^"'^ invalid.
One is the subject of spontaneous impulses and appetences which
persistently act as incitements to evil conduct, and he has a sense
of condemnation, even though no evil conduct follows. Why?
Not simply because he has such impulses and appetences, but be-
cause of a sense of responsibility for them. This is necessary to the
self-condemnation. Why this sense of responsibility? Because of
an underlying conviction that by the help of grace he might have
promptly repressed or wholly prevented these feelings, and that he
ought to have so done. This deeper insight discovers in his self-
condemnation the sense of violated obligation. Conscience con-y
demns him, not for the sin of a nature with which he was born, but'
for his own actual sin. There is nothing in such an experience
' Theological Essays, p. 338.
r>10 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
which points to a sin of his nature. A sense of native demerit is
possible, but possible only with the previous belief of such demerit.
Thus one's doctrine must precede one's self-condemnation, and,
instead of being an induction reached and verified through experi-
ence, actually conditions and determines the experience. "When
native demerit is an article of one's creed, self-condemnation is in
the orderly working of conscience. It is the normal function of
conscience thus to affirm the moral judgment which the creed ex-
presses. But surely the creed which conditions and determines
one's experience, and must determine it just the same if false as if
true, can receive no verification or proof from such experience.
4. Argument from Primitive Holiness. — The argument is this:
Adam was holy in his primitive nature; therefore we may be sinful
in our fallen nature, and sinful in the sense of demerit. If the
argument were valid it could prove only the possibility, not the
actuality of native sinfulness. It is not valid, because there is far
more in the conclusion than the premise warrants. It is proper to
place in comparison the primitive state of Adam and the fallen state
of the race. What he was in respect to holiness we may be in re-
spect to sinfulness. What was the holiness of Adam? Simply a
subjective state, free from evil tendencies, and with spontaneous
inclination to the good. It possessed no strictly ethical character,
such as arises, and can arise only, from holy obedience to the
divine will. There is blessedness in this state, but no rewardable
merit, no Avorthiness in any proper sense rewardable. Compare
with this the fallen state of man. What is it in the comparison?
A state of depravity, with spontaneous aversion to the good and
inclination to the evil. There is moral ruin in this state, but no
demerit or damnable sin. This is all the comparison will allow.
The holiness of Adam affords no proof of demerit in the common
native depravity.
II. Difficulties of the Doctrixe,
We have found the arguments for native sinfulness in the sense
of demerit entirely insufficient for its proof. With this result the
question might be dismissed; but there are difficulties of the doc-
trine which should be adduced in its more direct refutation.
1. Demerit of a Mere Nature. — The native demerit is affirmed
of the nature itself. The judicial ground of the divine judgment
and penal wrath is placed in its own intrinsic sinfulness. The de-
merit is the sin of the nature with which we are born, and there-
fore must precede its development into personality. But a mere
nature cannot be the subject of demerit; and guilt could as well be
DOCTRINE OF NATIVE DEMERIT. 517
afBrmed of a mere animal nature as of the human. Demerit must
always be a personal fact. If it be said that the ground of the
demerit lies in the impersonal nature, but that the amenability to
punishment arises with the development of the nature into person-
ality, then let the doctrine explain and justify the responsibility of
the person for the nature with which he was born.
2. Demerit toitliout Fet'sonal Agency. — This is the implication
of the doctrine, and the principle is openly avowed and maintained.
The higher realism, as previously reviewed, has the logical right of
a denial — that is, consistently with itself it may deny the implication
of demerit without personal agency. Indeed, the theory is openly)
pronounced against the possibility of such demerit. But the mode
of securing the personal agency and responsibility for the alleged
native sinfulness we have previously shown to be utterly insuflBcient;
so that, while this realistic theory may consistently with itself deny
the implication of demerit without personal agency, it is as really
involved in this implication as the representative theory. Native
demerit, or the demerit of the nature with which one is born, is
and must be wholly apart from one's own agency. The only escape
from this fact must be sought in the theory of the j)ersonal sinning
of each soul in a pre-temporal existence. This theory was pre-
viously considered and needs no further attention here. The al-
leged demerit is the fifth link in a chain of five: 1. the ^ c„^ii^ ^p
sinning of Adam; 2. the immediate imputation of the ^^"^^ links.
guilt of his sin to the race; 3. the divine punishment of the race
on the ground of this imputation; 4. the common native depravity
as the consequence of that penal infliction; 5. the intrinsic sinful-
ness and demerit of the common native depravity.
We are all absolutely without any personal agency in a single
link of this chain. It is not even pretended that we no agency in
have any. The doctrine is, that the universal amena- ^^"^^one.
bility to an eternal penal doom arises from the common native de-
pravity passively inherited from Adam. If consistently with the
divine justice there can be such native sinfulness, such penal desert
of a mere nature passively received, then the absolute infliction of
the deserved punishment upon all the race, and in an eternal penal
doom, would be equally consistent with that justice. There can be
no injustice in the infliction of deserved penalty. If such are the
possibilities respecting the human race, there must be possible
modes wherein the guilt of sin could be spread over the moral uni-
verse, and all intelligences without any agency of their own be
justly whelmed in an eternal penal doom. There must be error in
a doctrine which clearly points to such possibilities.
518 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
3. Demerit of Childhood. — This goes with the doctrine of an in-
trinsic sinfulness and demerit of the nature with which we are
born. The doctrine has the fullest avowal. Hence, if it be true,
the infant just born, yea, and before it is born, deserves an eternal
penal doom, and might be justly so punished.
4. Demerit from Punishment. — This is not only an inevitable
implication of the doctrine, but is openly avowed. Sin is punished
with sin — the punishment of sin is sin. Native depravity is a
judicial infliction on the ground of Adamic sin; and native de-
pravity is the very seat and substance of native sin and demerit.
But punishment, however just, cannot deserve further punishment.
Penalty carries over no sin to the subject of its infliction. If pun-
ishment created the desert of further punishment there could be
no arrest of the ever deepening doom. There is no such law of
justice either human or divine.
b. An Unintelligible Sin. — What is the sin of a nature considered
as demerit and amenability to punishment? Native dejjravity is
the corruption of the moral nature, with its characteristic tendency
to evil, and the source of actual sin. When we say the source of
actual sin we cannot mean the agent in the actual sinning. All
that we can mean is that it acts as an incitement of the joersonal
agent toward sinning. The corrupt nature cannot itself sin; and
the doctrine is, not that it sins and has demerit on that account,
but that it is sin, and in a sense to have penal desert.
What is this intrinsic sin of our common native depravity? Is
it definable as sin? Is its demerit a fixed quantity as
INDEFINABLE. , Mi J! • • • ^i. +1
the guilt of one sin, or an increasing quantity as the
guilt of repeated sins? This subjective state is in itself ever the
same irrespective of our personal agency; the same in our sleeping
as in our waking hours. Does the demerit increase as one's life
lengthens, and in its unconscious hours just as in the conscious?
Dr. Summers, himself an Arminian, after maintaining the doc-
trine of native sinfulness, says: "Thus the princijile out of which
the action springs is sinful, as well as the action itself. The un-
regenerate man is a sinner all the time; that is his character when
asleep or at work, as well as when he is in the very act of trans-
gressing. All jurisprudence is based on this.*' ' The citation might
be accepted as a statement of the sin of our nature, if this could be
viewed as one sin, with a definite amount of guilt; but there is no
light in the view as stated, and hence no explication of the real
perplexities of the question.
This sin is intrinsic to the native corruption of our nature. It
' Systematic Tlieology, vol. ii, pp. 53, 54.
DOCTRINE OF NATIVE DEMERIT. 519
does not lie in the inheritance of tliis corrupt nature, nor in its
incitements to evil-doing, nor in the actual sin which only of the
it may prompt, which is purely a personal sin com- nature.
mitted in the exercise of a responsible personal agency. To
locate this sin in any of these specified facts is to deny it to the
corrupt nature, and thus to contradict the deepest principle of
the doctrine. To locate it in the incitements of the corrupt
nature to evil-doing is to deny its intrinsicalness to the nature. If
the demerit of the nature is still maintained on the ground of these
incitements they must be regarded as actual sins, for otherwise no
demerit of the nature could arise from them. This requires that
the nature be invested with the powers of a resjionsibleiDersonality,
for only a person responsibly constituted can commit an actual sin.
Thus we should be led away from a sinful nature to a sinning nat-
ure, and from a nature in itself to a nature invested with person-
ality, and the doctrine of native demerit and damnableness would
be wholly lost. An actual sin, with the desert of punishment in the
sinner, is clearly open to the cognizance of the average mind, but
the sinfulness of a mere nature, with the desert of punishment, is
hidden in obscurity. Its utter unintelligibility disproves its reality.
G. The Ground of Election and Reprobation. — That native sin-
fulness furnishes the ground of election and reprobation is a per-
plexity for such Arminians as hold the doctrine rather than for
Calvinism. Indeed, as previously shown, it is not only in full
accord with this system, but is a vital principle of the system in its
prevalent infralapsarian form. Of course no Arminian can hold
the special election and reprobation so fully wrought into Calvin-
ism. No more can he consistently admit any sufficient ground for
them. Such, therefore, as hold the doctrine of native sinfulness
must either deny that it furnishes real and sufficient ground for
election and reprobation, or attempt a modification of the doctrine
in a manner to avoid this consequence. The latter is the course
uniformly taken. The question is specially concerned with the
decree of reprobation or preterition.
If our native depravity is of the nature of sin, and of sin in a
sense to deserve an eternal penal doom, there could be the ground
no injustice in the infliction of the penalty. Penalty valid.
is never unjust, and never can be unjust, while within the limit of
sinful demerit. Hence, out of this world of sinners, if it so please
God, he might elect a part unto salvation and leave the rest to the
just punishment of their sin. We might assume that his mercy
was partial, but could not say that his justice was cruel or even
partial. It does not appear in the doctrine, that justice asserted
520 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
any unyielding claim for tlic punishment of a part, but only that
it pleased the divine goodness to save a part, and to leave the rest
to the just punishment of their sin. Such would have been the
righteous doom of all, had it not pleased the divine love savingly
to interpose in behalf of a part. This is the doctrine, and one
that has received frequent expression in confessional symbols and
individual utterance. If the doctrine of native sinfulness, withl
the desert of an eternal penal doom, be true, sublapsarian Cal-1
vinism is thereby furnished with real and sufficient ground for
the doctrine of election and reprobation which it maintains. It is
well for Arminians to see this, and to see it clearly. Some do thus
see it. " Methodism clearly perceives that to admit that mankind
are actually born into the world justly under condemnation is to
grant the foundation of the whole Calvinistic scheme. Granted
natal desert of damnation, there can be no valid objection to the sov-
ereign election of a few out of the reprobate mass, or to limited atone-
ment, irresistible grace, and final perseverance to secure the present
and eternal salvation of the sovereignly predestinated number."'
In the way of seemingly, but only seemingly, adverse criticism,
INVALID ^ir. "Watson says: "It is an easy and plausible thing
ciuTicisjr. to say, in the usual loose and general manner of stating
the sublapsarian doctrine, that the whole race having fallen in
Adam, and become justly liable to eternal death, God might, without
any impeachment of his justice, in the exercise of his sovereign
grace, appoint some to life and salvation by Christ, and leave the
others to their deserved punishment." * If the native sinfulness be
accepted as a truth, the statement of the sublaj)sarian doctrine is
surely easy enough because of its thorough ground in such sinful-
ness. Nor is such statement merely plausible or loose and general,
but definite, consistent, and well grounded. In these words there
is not the slightest dissent from Mr. Watson, and for the reason
that in the citation he neither denies nor even questions the suffi-
ciency of such native sinfulness as the ground of election and rej)-
robation. It was in view of this fact that we qualified his state-
ment as only a seemingly adverse criticism of this position.
In accordance with all this, Mr. "Watson proceeds at once to dis-
TiiE GROUND P^^^© tlic Calviuistic position by an open denial of the
CONCEDED. assumed native sinfulness. *' But this is a false view
of the case, built upon the false assumption that the whole race
were personally and individually, in consequence of Adam's fall,
absolutely liable to eternal death. That very fact which is the
• Summers : Systematic Theology, vol. ii, p. 38. By the editor.
' Theological Institutes, vol. ii, p. 394.
DOCTKINE OF NATIVE DEMERIT. 521
foundation of the whole scheme, is easy to be refuted on the clear-
est authority of Scripture; while not a passage can be adduced,
we may boldly affirm, which sanctions any such doctrine. ' The
wages of sin is death.' That the death which is the wages or pen-
alty of sin extends to eternal death, we have before proved. But
^ sin is the transgression of the law;' and in no other light is it
represented in Scripture, when eternal death is threatened as its
penalty, than as the act of a rational being sinning against a law
known or knowable, and as an act avoidable, and not forced or
necessary.-" ' As only such sin can be justly liable to eternal pun-
ishment, and as the human race, descended from Adam, had no
part in the commission of any such sin previous to birth, therefore
they could not be born with any sin amenable to an eternal penal
doom. This is good and wholesome doctrine, and withal truly
Arminian. It would be well for Arminians rigidly to adhere to it,
and never to hold or maintain the contrary or any thing which im-
plies the contrary. Their fundamental principles would thus be
S3cure, and no open place would be yielded to the doctrine of elec-
tion and reprobation.
III. The True Armixiax Doctrin^e.
1. Native Depravity ^vWiout Native Demerit. — We have pre-
viously shown that native depravity as a fact, and its sinfulness in
a sense to deserve divine j)unishment, are distinct questions, and
open to separate answers. The trutli of the latter is no con-
sequence of the truth of the former. We have maintained the
reality of native depravity, but controverted the doctrine of its '
intrinsic demerit, and have no occasion to renew the discussion.
The present aim is to point out the true position of Arminian-
ism on the question of native sinfulness in the sense of penal
desert, whether assumed to be grounded in a participation in
the sin of Adam or in the corruption of nature inherited from him.
That position, as we view it, is accurately exjDressed in the above
heading: native depravity without native demerit. Native deprav-
ity is a part of the Arminian system, and entirely consistent with /
its principles; native demerit is discordant and contradictory. °
* Theological Institutes, vol. ii, pp. 394, 395.
^ Much of the Arminian treatment of original sin is unsatisfactory. Native
desert of penal retribution cannot be reconciled with the determining princi-
ples of the Arminian system. Hence Arminians who accept such a doctrine
of original sin, as not a few have done, are involved in confusion and contra-
diction in attempting its reconciliation with their own system. These facta
call for a thorough review of the Arminian treatment of original sin. Such a
review will be given in an appendix to our second volume.
522 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
The question may be tested by the principle of freedom in
^„„.o.^.. Armiuianism. There is no more fundamental prin-
pRiNcii'LKOF ciple. It occupies much the same position in this
FUKhDOM. system that the divine sovereignty occupies in Cal-
vinism. As this sovereignty underlies the predestination, the
monergism, the irresistibility of grace, and the final persever-
ance, in the one; so freedom underlies the synergism, the
real conditionality of salvation, and the possibility of apostasy in
the other. In Arminianism freedom must include the power of
choosing the good, as the necessary ground of a responsible proba-
tion. Itepentance and faith as requisite to salvation must be possi-
ble; punishable deeds must be avoidable; responsible duties must
be practicable. This is the meaning of Arminianism in the main-
tenance of a universal grace througli a universal atonement; a grace
which lifts up mankind into freedom, with power to choose the
good. Such freedom is the condition of moral responsibility; and
without it we could be neither sinful nor punishable, because our
moral life could not proceed from our own personal agency. This
is the doctrine of Arminianism, always and cvery-where firmly
maintained. But if we could not be sinful and punishable in our
actual life without free personal agency, or through morally neces-
sitated evil deeds, how can we be sinful and punishable through
tlie sin of Adam, or on the ground of an inherited corruption of
nature? Nothing could be more utterly apart from our own agency
than the one or the other. Notliing could be imposed by a more
absolute necessitation. Native sinfulness in the sense of punitive
desert is, therefore, openly contradictory to the deepest and most
determining principle of the Arminian system.
With the doctrine of native demerit there is confusion and con-
„ ^ tradiction in the Arminian treatment of original sin.
THE FREE . _ O
jnsTiFicA- This result is not from any unskillful handling of that
'^^^^' doctrine, but from its intrinsic oiDposition to the ruling
principles of this system. The attempted adjustment to these
principles finds no resting-jjlace until it reaches a free cancellation
of that form of sin through the grace of a universal atonement.
But this outcome is doctrinally much the same as the denial of
original sin in the sense of demerit. It may remain in the theory,
but must not be allowed to come into actuality. This is the usual
outcome with Arminians who start with the doctrine of original
sin in the sense of demerit. It is far better to start with the true
Arminian doctrine than to reach it through so much doctrinal con-
fusion and contradiction.
2. The Doctrine of our Seventh Article. — Articles of faith.
DOCTRINE OF NATIVE DEMERIT. 523
whether formulated or appropriated by any particular Church, con-
stitute the most definitive and authoritative expression of her doc-
trines. No exception can be admitted in the case of any doctrine
so established. Peculiar doctrines, omitted in such articles, but
grounded in approved teaching or in a common consensus, could
be no exception. No diversities of interpretation can affect the
principle; no improved formulation on the part of individuals can
replace any established article. This principle is thoroughly valid
for our seventh article, which defines our doctrine " of original or
birth sin," and will be of service in its interpretation. We must
view it first in its terms, and then in its history.
" Original sin standeth not in the following of Adam, (as the
Pelagians do vainly talk,) but it is the corruption of original or
the nature of every man, that naturally is engendered ^'^'^^ ^'^'•
of the offspring of Adam, whereby man is very far gone from
original righteousness, and of his own nature inclined to evil, and
that continually."
Pelagianism went to the opposite extreme from the Augustinian an-
thropology, and not only denied all responsible participation of the
race in the sin of Adam, but equally the corruption of human nature
in consequence of his fall. We enter into life in the same moral state
in Avhich Adam began his. The consequence of his sin to the race
is limited to the moral force of an evil example. First of all, the
article repudiates this view. Its falsity wo have previously shown.
Affirmatively defined, original sin " is the corruption of the nat-
ure of every man, that naturally is engendered of the akkirma-
offspring of Adam, whereby man is very far gone from tivki.y de-
original righteousness, and of his own nature inclined
to evil, and that continually." The doctrine we have maintained
is in full accord with these definitive facts. We have fully asserted
the loss of original righteousness, and the corruption of human
nature, as consequences of the Adamic fall. We have maintained
the common inclination to evil as the characteristic fact and the
proof of native depravity. In maintaining the genetic transmis-
sion of this corruption of nature from Adam down through the
race we are thoroughly at one with the article, which declares it to
be "'naturally engendered of the offspring of Adam."
The omissions of this article, as compared with other formula-
tions of a doctrine of original sin, are worthy of special notice.
There is not one word about a sharing of the race in the sin of
Adam, or about the corruption of human nature as a judicial in-
fliction on the ground of a common Adamic guilt. Nor is there
one word which expresses or even implies an intrinsic sinfulness
524 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
and damnablcness of this inherited corruption of nature. There-
fore we could controvert these special elements of the Augustinian
doctrine, as we have done, without the slightest departure from our
own doctrine as formulated in this article.
The history of the article as a part of our own creed gives special
HISTORY OF doctrinal significance to this total absence of any sense
THE ARTICLE, of an Intriusic slnfulncss of our native depravity. It
is the ninth article of the Church of England, but greatly changed,
especially by elimination. The change was made by Mr. Wesley,
who, in 1784, prepared, and sent over by Bishoj) Coke, a set of arti-
cles for the American Methodists, then to be organized into a
Church. These articles came before the notable Christmas Confer-
ence of 1784, which organized the Church. Nor were they pass-
ively accepted from Mr. Wesley, but were formally adopted by the
Conference. So have they stood in our creed from the beginning.
What is thus true of all the articles is true of the seventh. The
doctrinal meaning of the change made in the original article ajipears
in the light of these facts.' If the article, just as it stands, had been
an original formulation by Mr. Wesley or the Christmas Confer-
ence, the sense of an intrinsic penal desert of an inherited corrup-
tion of our nature could not be read into it. Much more is such a
sense excluded by the formal elimination of every word which ex-
pressed it in the appropriated article. Every such word was so
eliminated; not only the strong words, "it deserveth God's wrath
and damnation," but the far softer word "fault," as applied to
this nature. It follows that native dej^ravity without demerit or
penal desert is the doctrine of our seventh article.^
It follows, further, that such is the doctrine of the Methodist
DOCTRINAL DE- Eplscopal Churcli. There has been much questioning
TERMINATION. aHioug divlucs of the Church of England resjoecting
the terms of penal desert in their own article.' Xot a few have
' We here give so much of the original article as concerns the present ques-
tion, and italicize the eliminations, that the change may be clearly seen :
Original sin standeth not in the following of Adam (as the Pelagians do vainly
talk), but it isthe/(ra/( and corruption of the nature of every man, that nat-
urally is engendered of the oflEspring of Adam, whereby man is very far gone
from original righteousness, and is of his own nature inclined to evil, so that
the flesh lusteth always contrary to the spirit, and therefore in every person
bom into this world, it deserreth God's wrath and damnation.
"^ Such is our article " of original or birth sin ; " and, so far as we know, it is
the article of all the Methodist Churches of America. Hence, when Dr. Pope
said, as we previously noted, that Methodism accepts the ninth article of the
Church of England on original sin, clearly he was historically inaccurate.
^ Burnet, Lawrence, and Forbes severally on the Thirty-nine Articles, article ix.
DOCTRINE OF NATIVE DEMERIT. 625
recoiled from their more obvious sense, and tried to soften their
severer import. The complete elimination of these terms not only
frees us from all such questioning, but wholly excludes from our
doctrine the sense of demerit in native depravity. On a principle
previously stated, our seventh article so determines our doctrine of
original sin, that nothing contrary to it can have any authority on
this question. For instance, in our second article the words still
remain which set forth Christ as a sacrifice ''for original guilt" as
well as for ''actual sins." This recognition of native guilt should
have been eliminated from the second article in order to bring it
into harmony with the seventh. The simplest explanation of its
remaining is through mere oversight in the revision of the articles.
Whatever the explanation, on this question of original sin the
words can have no doctrinal weight against the specific ^o contrary
seventh article. Any utterances in the writings of authority.
Wesley himself contrary to this article miTst yield to its doctrinal
authority. "Wesley rejects the doctrine of our personal desert of
damnation here affirmed, for the very good reason that it contra-
dicts our intuitive sense of right and justice. That rejection
removes a contradiction to the moral sense and to common sense
from theology. Great were Wesley's logical powers; greater his
adniinistrativG powers; but greatest of all his intuitive powers. His
primitive intuitive perceptions might for the time being be over-
borne by hereditary prejudices, or clamor of dogmas, or the tem-
porary exigencies of argument; but when he hushed all these
hinderances down, his intuitive faculties spoke with an almost in-
fallible clearness. And undoubtedly the moment when he prepared
these twenty-four articles was, if any moment of his life, the
crisis when he looked at pure, absolute truth. Those articles were
to be for all Methodism standard ; and if ever, in sermon, essay,
treatise, or commentary, he has expressed a different view, that dif-
ferent view is canceled before this one monumental work. Wesley
himself would have to be over-ruled by his own twenty-four articles
by us accepted ' of faith.' " ' What is thus true of all the articles is
specially true of the seventh, — specially, because of the profound
doctrinal change made in it by elimination."
Our theologians, who in the treatment of anthropology asserted
' WTiedon : Methodist Quarterly Review, 1882, p. 365.
2 In the earlier writings of Wesley there are utterances doctrinally contrary
to this article, and which therefore must be canceled by its supreme author-
ity. In his Southern Review, 1876, Dr. Bledsoe ably discussed the doctrinal
significance of the change in this article, and maintained, as a sure implica-
tion, that in his later years Wesley repudiated his earlier views of original sin.
520 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
a strong doctrine of native demerit, yet in the fuller discussion of
the Arminian system, particularly in its issues with
PRACTICAL . . "f ■" ^ . ^
UNITY OF Calvinism, practically came into full harmony with the
DOCTRINE. doctrine of our seventh article. Others, however, have
denied the native demerit and from the beginning maintained
the doctrine of the article. Kespecting inherited depravity, Dr.
Fisk says: "The guilt of depravity is not imputed to the subjsct
of it until by intelligent volition he makes the guilt his own by re-
sisting and rejecting the grace of the Gospel."' It has already
appeared that such is the view of Dr. Whedon. Against the doc-
trine of reprobation, which grounds itself in the assumption that
all men deserve an eternal penal doom simply on account of original
sin, he says: " We hold, on the contrary, that though sinward
tendencies exist in germ in the infant, yet there is no responsibil-
ity, and no damnability, nntil these tendencies are deliberately and
knowingly acted in real life, and by that action appropriated and
sanctioned.'" The decisive doctrinal point in both citations is
that, with the reality of native depravity, guilt can arise only on
the ground of responsible personal volition.
There is a special Arminian view of original sin which should not
be passed without notice. While denying all sharing
ARMINIAN of the race in the guilt of Adam's sin, it asserts a com-
^'^^" mon guilt on the ground of inherited depravity, and
then covers this guilt with the canceling grace of justification.'
This view is specially open to criticism, and for any consistency of
doctrine should maintain a common infant regeneration as well as
justification. If inherited depravity is intrinsically sinful, so as to
involve us in guilt and condemnation, justification is impossible so
long as it remains. It is the doctrine of some creeds that a portion
of original sin remains in the regenerate, but that the guilt thereof
is not imputed to believers.^ There is great perplexity even in
this view. It is not claimed that this remnant of original sin is
different in moral character from the prior whole; rather it is de-
clared to be of the nature of sin, just as the prior whole. How
then can we be justified from the guilt of a nature, though but a
modicum of the original whole, but which is intrinsically sinful
and still remains within us? Let anyone analyze this question and
set it in the light of clear thought, and he will find the answer
very perplexing. IIow then shall we explain the justification of
' Calvinistic Controversy, p. 183. * Commentary, Eph. ii, 3.
^ Summers : Systematic Theolofjy, vol. ii, pp. 36-39. By the editor.
* Articles of the Church of England, article ix ; Westminster Confession,
chap, vi, sec. v.
DOCTRINE OF NATIVE DEMERIT. 527
infants who are born with the totality of this corrupt and sinful
nature? There is no possible explanation. With such a doctrine
of original sin infant regeneration must go with infant justifica-
tion, for otherwise the latter is impossible. Further, if infants are
born in a regenerate state, the ground of native guilt has disap-
peared, and there is no need of the justification. And, finally,
with the disappearance of native depravity, the doctrinal outcome
stands rather with Pelagius and Socinus than with Arminius and
Wesley.
3. TJte Requirement of a True Definition of Sin. — There can
be no true definition of sin which includes the guilt of an inherited
nature. A mere nature cannot be the subject of guilt. No more
can it be sinful in the sense of penal desert. Only a person can be
the subject of guilt; and a person can be a responsible sinner only
through his own agency. There can be no true definition of sin
which omits a responsible personal agency. Arminianism can ad-
mit no definition which omits such agency or includes the guilt of
an inherited corruption of nature.
A prominent definition is given in these words: " Sin is any want
of conformity unto, or transgrcGsion of, the law of instances of
God." ' There is no objection to this formula, as it DEnNixioN.
may be fairly interpreted consistently with a true definition. Ifc
does not exclude personal agency from any form of responsible
sin. Yet it is often so interpreted and applied to the common in-
herited depravity. The meaning is, that this nature is out of con-
formity with the law of God, and therefore it is sin. This sense
contradicts the imperative principles above stated, and means that
simply on the ground of an inherited corruption of nature every
infant is a responsible sinner and deserves an eternal jienal doom.
Any sinful non-conformity to the law of God must have respect to
the law^s demands. It, hov/ever, lays no demands upon human
nature, simply as such, and without personality. Hence there can
be no sinful disconformity of an inherited nature to the law of
God. The divine laAV lays its demands upon persons, and only
upon persons. If these demands have respect to our inner nature,
and even to our inherited depravity, still they are laid upon us in
our personality, and with the recognition of our personal responsi-
bility for oar present moral state. While not responsible for the
corruption of our nature by genetic transmission, yet, with tlio
grace of purification freely offered and at hand, we are justly re-
sponsible for its continuance. Still, the law makes its demands of
us in our personality, and any sinful disconformity to these de-
* Westminster Confession : Shorter Catechism, Q. 14.
528 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
mands involves our personal agency. Another definition of the
Westminster Confession gives the true principle, which really ex-
chides such an erroneous interpretation: "^ Sin is any want of con-
formity unto, or transgression of any law of God, given as a rule to
the reasonable creature." ' The ruling principle of this definition
is, that sin is some form of disobedience to a divine law imposed
upon a rational subject. Such a subject must be a person, with
the power of personal agency; and only through his own agency
can he become a responsible sinner according to the terms of this
definition.
Arminius gives, by appropriation, a good definition of sin:
FCRTiiERDEF- " Somcthing thought, spoken, or done against the law
ixiTioNs. Qf God; or the omission of something which has been
commanded by that laAv to be thought, spoken, or done."' The
sin so defined he calls, by general characterization, actual sin. In
the details all the forms of actual sin may be included; and equally
all the forms of responsible sin which an Arminian definition can
consistently include. In replying to an objection assumed to con-
tradict the possibility of salvation from all sin in the present life,
Mr. Wesley gives a definition of sin: ''I answer, it will perfectly
well consist with salvation from sin, according to that definition of
sin (which I apprehend to be the scriptural definition of it), a vol-
nntary frans(/ression of a hnoivn laic."^ It is entirely consistent
Avith this definition so to broaden the sense of transgression as to
include all forms of disobedience to the divine law, and even all
the details given in the definition of Arminius. The voluntary
element goes with all. In close connection with the definition the
same sense of sin is asserted, and a contrary sense discarded. Both
the definitions in this paragraph are in full accord with Arminian
doctrine.
We add our own definition: Sin is disobedience to a law of God,
i>KKixiTioN conditioned on free moral agency and opportunity of
«■'" SIX. Icnowing the laic. In this view, law is the expression
cf the divine will respecting human dut}', and the mode of the ex-
pression is indifferent to the jDrinciples of the definition. The dis-
obedience may be either a transgression or an omission; in either
thought or feeling, word or deed. It must bo some doing or omis-
sion of doing; therefore, really some doing. An omission of duty
is as really voluntary as any act of transgression. The specified
free agency and opportunity of knowing the law are necessary con-
ditions of moral responsibility, and therefore the necessary condi-
' The Larger Catechism, Q. 24. ' Writings, vol. i, p. 486.
"Sermons, vol. ii, p. 173.
DOCTRINE OF NATIVE DEjMERIT. 529
tions of sin. Such disobedience, and only such, is sin in the sense
of penal desert. Omit any specified element, or admit any con-
trary element, and there can be no true definition of sin. Native
demerit excludes every element of the true definition. Therefore
native depravity cannot be sin in the sense of penal desert.
4. Native Depravity a Reality and a Moral Ruin. — We previously
pointed out that native depravity, as a subjective moral state, is
the very same under a law of genetic transmission that it would be
if a judicial infliction on the ground of a common Adamic guilt.
So, we here point out that, as such a state, it is the very same
without the demerit of sin that it would be with such demerit. It
follows that the reality of native depravity is not aifected by the
disproof of its intrinsic sinfulness. The argument previously
maintained in proof of native depravity fully remains in its con-
clusiveness.
Nor is the common native depravity any less really a state of
moral ruin. The evils attributed to it in our own ar- g^.^^^. ^p ^q^.
tides are intrinsic to its nature. " It is the corruption ^^ Ri''^-
of the nature of every man, that naturally is engendered of the
offspring of Adam, whereby man is very far gone from original
righteousness, and of his own nature inclined to evil, and that
continually." This is a state of alienage from the true spiritual
life, and utterly without fitness for a state of holy blessedness. Nor
have we any power of self -redemption. " The condition of man
after the fall of Adam is such that he cannot turn and prepare him-
self, by his own natural strength and works, to faith, and calling
upon God; wherefore we have no power to do good works, pleas-
ant, and acceptable to God, without the grace of God by Christ
preventing us, that we may have a good will, and working with us,
when we have that good will," ' Such is the doctrine of native de-
pravity which we have maintained, while controverting the assump-
tion of its intrinsic sinfulness.
How then is Christ the Saviour of infants, particularly of such
as die in infancy ? This question will not fail to be salvation of
asked. " But if the infant is irresponsible, how can infants.
Christ be to him a pardoner of sin and a Saviour? We might reply,
that it does not make Christ any pardoner of sin to imagine a fac-
titious sin, or a guilt which has no foundation in the nature of
things. The pardon will remain just as factitious, just as merely
verbal, as the guilt to be pardoned. But Christ still stands a
Saviour to the infant, as we hold, in the following respects: 1. We
^ have elsewhere shown that had Christ not been given the race
' Articles vii, viii.
35
530 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
would, in all probability, not have been permitted to be propagated
after the fall. . . . ISo the grace of Christ underlies the very ex-
istence of every human being that is born. 2. Between the infant
descendant of fallen Adam and God there is a contrariety of moral
nature, by which the former is irresponsibly, and in undeveloped
condition, averse to the latter, and so displacent to him. By
Christ, the Mediator, that averseness is regeneratively removed, and
the divine complacency restored: so that the race is enabled to
persist under the divine grace, 3. Christ, in case of infant death,
entirely removes this sin ward nature, so as to harmonize the being
with the holiness of heaven. 4. Christ is the infant's justifier
against every accuser . . . whether devils, evil men, or mistaken
theologians; asserting their claim through his merits, in spite of
their fallen lineage, to redemption and heaven. Being thus puri-
fied, justified, and glorified by Christ, none are more truly qualified
to join in the song of Moses and the Lamb." '
Careful and candid students of historical theology, on the ques-
tion of anthropology assign to Arminianism the doctrinal position
which we have maintained — native depravity without native de-
merit.*
0. Question of Practical Besztlts. — The doctrine of native de-
merit is often commended on an assumption of practical value.
The view is this: the deeper the sense of sin, the more thorough is
the moral recovery and the intenser the spiritual life; the deepest
sense of sin is possible only with the doctrine of native demerit;
hence the practical value of the doctrine. The major premise is
not questioned ; but the minor is disputed. Besides, with the
admission of practical benefit, the doctrine may have evil conse-
quences which more than balance the good.
The deepest sense of sin is possible only with the sense of per-
THK SENSE sonal culpability. No form of original sin can furnish
OK SIN. this element. Even tlie higher realism does not assume
that we can have any personal consciousness of a responsible shar-
ing in the sin of Adam. The alleged ground of such sharing is
purely speculative, and too shadowy for any real sense of culpabil-
ity for that sin. The representative theory is quite as impotent.
Indeed, in its own definitions it denies the culiiability of the race
for the sin of Adam. The demerit of that sin was personal to him-
self and untransferable to his offspring. So the doctrine asserts.
' Whedon : Commentary, Epli. ii, 3.
* Hill : Divinity, pp. 398-400 ; Cunningham : Historical Theology, vol. ii,
p. 388 ; Midler : Christian Doctrine of Sin, vol. ii, p. 320 ; Shedd : History of
Doctrines, vol. ii, pp. 178-186 ; Scliaff : Creeds of Christendom, vol. i, p. 897.
DOCTRINE OF NATIVE DEMERIT. 531
Here is the difference between reatus culpm and reatus pmncB. We
are amenable to the- punishment of Adam's sin, but not guilty of
the sin itself — do not share its culpability or turpitude. The dif-
ference is profound, and must be profound for our moral conscious-
ness. A mere guilt judicially imposed, and without any ground in
personal desert, never can bring the soul into that deep sense of sin
which is of special value in its moral recovery. There can be no
true sense of responsibility for the derivation of a depraved nature
from Adam. If on reaching a responsible age the stirrings of this
nature trouble the conscience, let the experience be analyzed, and
there will be found underlying the sense of responsibility the deeper
sense of power in hand, or power at hand, to restrain these im-
pulses and to prevent their ruling power in the life. It is only at
the point where personal agency meets the activities of this inher-
ited nature that the true sense of responsibility can arise. We do
not find in the doctrine of native guilt the element of practical
value assumed in its commendation.
The doctrine tends to excess, and in its earlier history soon ran
into great exaggeration; so much so as to absorb atten- ^.^iltenden-
tion and quite dismiss the infinitely deeper turpitude cies of the
of actual sin as a matter of comparatively little con-
cern. Since the time of Augustine, and in the line of his follow-
ing, native sinfulness in the sense of penal desert has been the great
theme of doctrinal anthropology. It has dominated the view of
the atonement and the interpretation of Scripture. The atone-
ment meets its profoundest necessity in the enormity of native
guilt. The question has even been raised whether Christ atoned
for any other form of sin. After Paul proves by a great argument
the universality of actual sin, and in that truth grounds the neces-
sity for the atonement and justification by faith, his doctrine of sin
is interpreted as having almost exclusive reference to original sin —
that form of guilt and damnableness in which all are held to be
born. The world of actual sinners is thus dismissed from the view
of Paul, and the world of infants is put in their place as though the
very worst of sinners. This appears in the interpretation of a pop-
ular statement of Paul (Kom. v, 12-19) respecting the relation of
the Adamic fall to the universal sinfulness, and the relation of the
atonement in Christ to our justification and salvation. This exag-
geration of native sinfulness, with the consequence of pushing
men's actual and personally responsible sins so much out " of view,
cannot be a practical good; indeed, must be a practical evil.
The early history of the doctrine discloses very serious conse-
quences of evil to the true Christian life. These evils appeared in
532 SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY.
baptismal regeueratiou and sacerdotalism. It is not meant that
8HIRITUALDKT- t'ltlicF liad Its Inccption wltli Augustlne. Both appear
uiMKNT. \ix the high ecclesiasticism of which Cyprian was a chief
representative. But there was already a strong doctrine of native
guilt, as may be seen specially in Tertullian; and from their incep-
tion both baptismal regeneration and sacerdotalism will be found in
close connection with this doctrine. The doctrine of Augustine
fell in with those evil tendencies, .and so was received with the
greater favor.' His doctrine of native sin not only fell in with these
evils, but by its own exaggerated form greatly intensified them.
The hiw of this consequence is easily disclosed.
The doctrine of Augustine carried with it the damnation of in-
fants. This consequence was felt to be horrible. Augustine him-
self was appalled. No wonder that he cried to Jerome for help in
this awful perplexity. There could be no rest. All the better
feelings of pious souls cried out for relief. There were no eyes to
see the assured blessedness of dying infants in the free grace of a
universal atonement. Relief was sought in the sacrament of bap-
tism. Baptism must have power to wash away sin — must have,
because of the exigency of infant salvation. Baj)tism thus became
a saving ordinance; and, naturally enough, very soon for adult sin-
ners as well as for dying infants. Here was the source of infinite
detriment to the spiritual life of the Church. But if the sacra-
ments are saving we must have a priesthood for their proper ad-
ministration. Sacerdotalism is the result. Sacerdotalism, like
baptismal regeneration, has been a calamity to the Christian life.
By legitimate consequence, Augustine's exaggerated doctrine of na-
tive sin greatly strengthened and intensified both, and sent them
down the centuries as a fearful heritage of evil. Moral paralysis
and despair were in his doctrine. Within the moral and religious
sphere, man was absolutely helpless; a mass of sin and jDcrdition,
with power only to sin, and under the absolute necessity of sinning.
In the utter blackness and darkness of the doctrine no eyes could
see the universal grace of a universal atonement. We are pleased
to note that many who have inherited the substance of this doctrine
have freed themselves from its more serious consequences. Yet it
still widely nourishes and supports the deadly evils of baptismal
regeneration and sacerdotalism.
The doctrine we maintain is free from all such evil results, and
iiKiHESTPRAo- J^t carrics with it the very best practical forces. It is
TicAL vAixE. well known that the Metliodist doctrine of sin is great'y
modified by her doctrine of the atonement and the universality of
'Milman: Latin Christianity, vol. i, p. 172.
DOCTRINE OF NATIVE DEMERIT. 533
its grace. We have ever held the doctrine of a common native
depravity; that this depravity is in itself a moral ruin; and that
there is no power in us by nature unto a good life. But through
a universal atonement there is a universal grace — the light and
help of the Holy Spirit in every soul. If we are born with a
corrupt nature in descent from Adam, v/e receive our existence
under an economy of redemption, with a measure of the grace of
Christ. With such grace, which shall receive increase on its proper
use, we may turn unto the Lord and be saved. With these doc-
trines of native depravity and universal grace there is for every
soul the profoundest lesson of personal responsibility for sin, and
of the need of Christ in order to salvation and a good life.
General reference. — Augustine : On Original Sin, Works, vol. xii, Edin-
burgh, 1874 ; Calvin : Institutes, book ii, chaps, i-iii ; Witsius : Tfie Covenants,
book i ; Edwards : Original Sin, Works, vol. ii, part iv ; Wesley : The Doc-
trine of Original Sin, Works, vol. v, pp. 492-669 ; Wiggers : Augiistiniim and
Pt'Jagianism ; Hopkins: Doctrine of the Two Covenants; Straffen : Sin as Set
Forth in the Scriptures, Hulsean Lectures, 1874 ; Persier : Oneness of the Race
in its Fall and its Future, translated from the French ; Wallace : Representa-
tive Responsibility ; Dwight : Theology, sermons xxvi-xxxiii ; Baird : The
Elohim Revealed, chaps, vii-xviii ; Fitch : The Nature of Sin ; Princeton Es-
says, Original Sin, v ; Doctrine of Imputation, vi-viii ; Taylor : The Scripture
Doctrine of Original Sin ; Pond : Christian Theology, lects. xxix-xxxv ; Shedd :
The Doctrine of Original Sin, Theological Essays, pp. 211-264 ; Dogmatic The-
ology, Anthropology ; Hodge : Systematic Theology, Anthropology ; Laidlaw :
The Bible Doctrine of Man; Tulloch : The Christian Doctrine of Sin ; Board-
man : The Scripture Doctrine of Original Sin ; Flower : Adani's Disobedience
and its Results ; Burgess : Original Sin ; Landis : Original Sin, and Gratuitous
Imputation ; Glover : A Short Treatise on Original Sin ; Miiller : The Christian
Doctrine of Sin ; Fisher : Discussions in History and Theology, Augustinian
and Federal Theories ; Payne : The Doctrine of Original Sin, Congregational
Lectures, 1845 ; Curry : Fragments, Religious and Theological, i-iii ; Raymond:
Systematic Theology, Anthropology.
DATE DUE
M^i^..
i^spff^rl^
i^pfep^
l\^^^ ^
fii^
CAVLono
Live Music Archive
Librivox Free Audio
Metropolitan Museum
Cleveland Museum of Art
Internet Arcade
Console Living Room
Books to Borrow
Open Library
TV News
Understanding 9/11